Straight From The Heart
by Mummyluvr
Summary: He'd always been special. He just kind of forgot. Thanks to recent events, though, Dean's past is coming back to haunt him, bringing along some unwanted baggage in the form of his own freaky psychic powers.
1. Prologue

Oh, the classic 'if Dean had powers' story. Trust me, though. You'll want to read this one :)

**Title:** Stragiht From The Heart

**Rating:** T

**Summary:** He'd always been special. He just kind of forgot. Thanks to recent events, though, Dean's past is coming back to haunt him, bringing along some unwanted baggage in the form of his own freaky psychic powers.

**Warnings:** Other than the fact that I'm scared it's a little too sappy, nothing I can think of.

**Disclaimer:** Honestly, if I owned the show, Dean would get more screentime. And angst. And tears. Are you listening, Kripke! It's what the fans want!

* * *

Straight From The Heart

He'd always been special, his mother had said. He'd always known when to sit still and be good, when he could goof off, when she was sad, or when his father needed a hug. He'd known they were happy about something the minute they'd walked through the door after the first of many doctor's visits. He'd practically ambushed them, had made them tell him the secret.

He was going to be a big brother.

He was in tune with the baby, knew instinctively what the infant wanted when he cried. He was the best big brother ever, and his parents told him that every day. He knew exactly what they wanted, knew exactly what they were feeling, sometimes even before they did.

And then one night he woke up after a bad dream, a searing pain drawing its way across his four-year-old stomach, his whole body alight with burning pain. The feelings faded as he walked down the hall toward the nursery, desperate to find his parents and wallow in their love and safety and happiness.

The baby was thrust into his arms, and he could feel the raw sorrow and pain and fear radiating from his father. He did as daddy said, though. He did what daddy ordered. He took the baby outside as fast as he could and he didn't look back, not until they got onto the lawn and his whole childhood went up in smoke.

It didn't take him long after that to realize that he was a freak, that knowing what his family and those around him felt wasn't normal, but he never told anyone. He was too scared to tell. He didn't want the burning rage that had become an all-too familiar feeling when daddy was around to be turned at him. No, he liked it better when daddy was mad at the monsters.

So he never told, but he kept reading people. He read everyone he met, letting their emotions flow into him and provide him with comfort and warmth. Eventually, though, kind smiles turned into something else, hid something else, and he began trying to block them out. He didn't need to feel their sympathy. His family was just fine. There was nothing wrong with them.

He still read his father and brother, though. He liked doing nice things for the little boy, enjoyed the wave of happiness that washed over him when the kid's eyes lit up because big brother had come to the rescue. He liked the do everything his daddy told him to, when he was told to do it. He liked to feel his father's pride welling up within his own heart.

And then things changed. He was careless and selfish and his brother almost died. Suddenly, daddy wasn't proud anymore. Daddy wasn't nice. He wasn't happy. He was just scared and angry and disappointed.

So he began to build a wall, a wall that he'd started to build as soon as warmth and kindness had given way to sympathy. He blocked his father from his mind, blocked the disappointment, and for a while, he was ok.

Things changed again. The little boy that had once been so easy to please began to drift away, began to get angry. He didn't want to be part of the family anymore. He didn't want to have anything to do with them. And the wall got higher.

There were more people, over the years. People that rejected him, that took what little bit of himself that he gave them and stomped all over it. And the wall got higher. Sometimes they made him think that he was welcomed, and then they got rid of him. They made him think that he was loved, and they walked away. And the wall got higher.

The wall went up, the people stayed out, and he forgot he was special.

He remembered that he was a freak, though. He remembered the disappointment, anger, and rejection.

* * *

OK, so the prologue was short, but don't let that stop you from reading. Just remember that I try to update every day :) 

Oh, and, as always, a few reviews are greatly apprciated. I need my fix since ending my 'On Angel's Wings' series (which is good, by the way. You shoudl totally read it :)).


	2. Chapter 1

Wow. I think that's the largest number of reviews I've ever gotten for a first chapter before. I'd love to thank everyone individually, but I'm just not good at that kind of thing. Please, accept this chapter as a sign of my graditude :)**

* * *

**

**Straight From The Heart**

They were talking about him, standing hunched over in the corner, their voices low. They were talking about him, about how he was taking it. Sam was undoubtedly telling her about the smashed-up old piece of metal that had once covered the Impala's trunk, was whispering about the way his face was still sore after the vampire hunt, was muttering about the way the old college professor had cringed in fear and backed away.

He knew they were talking about him.

Sighing, Dean glanced up from his beer, his eyes flitting over to the pool table where Ash lay snoring before resting on the only other person at the bar. Jo Harvelle was busily flipping pages in a folder, glancing at the leather-bound book that sat beside her, and jotting notes down in an old notebook. She was helping her mother put together the details for a new hunt that they were sending someone (possibly the Winchesters) on.

The blonde, pretty in her own way (_yeah_, Dean's mind pointed out, _pretty annoying_), had, as usual, been all over the elder Winchester brother as soon as he'd walked through the door and into the Roadhouse. Now, however, her mind was elsewhere, skimming over pages of reports and trying to find a connection.

That was just fine with Dean. To tell the truth, he hadn't really felt much like interacting with the opposite sex lately. Ever since his father's death, that kind of thing just lost what minimal importance it had once held in his life. Now it seemed that everything just brought pain and memories flooding back through his system, and there was no way he could let it out. He'd already tried venting that rage, and the results hadn't exactly been good.

He sighed again, glancing back into his half-finished beer before suddenly snapping his head back up to look at Jo. He'd never noticed until just that moment how beautiful she actually looked under the dim lights of the bar. Her hair shimmered as she turned back to her notes, licking her lips and mouthing the words she was reading.

It seemed like, suddenly, he was seeing her in a whole different light, like his old feelings for her were being pushed aside so new ones could take control. He sidled up beside her at the bar, looking over her shoulder and taking the opportunity to smell her hair.

Jo looked over at him, a sly spark in her deep brown eyes. "Can I help you with something?"

"Actually," Dean said, suddenly giddy, "I was hoping _I_ could help _you_." He smiled. It seemed that her eye contact made any feelings of love grow stronger, made him more nervous, made him want to buy her a pizza and some beers and play her Zepplin IV.

"Well," she said softly, noticing the way he was looking at her, loving the way one of his hands slid slowly up her back while the other rested just above her knee, "I've got some more notes in my room, if you want to see them."

"That'd be great," he replied, happiness flooding through him as he took her small hand and led her back toward her room.

As the two lovebirds disappeared down the darkened hallway, Ash sat up, eyes wide. "What the hell?"

o0o0o0o0o

"When Bill passed," Ellen explained, leaning against the bar and watching as Sam's eyes darted nervously around the room, "it took Jo a while to adjust. She got mad, kind of like Dean, and started throwing tantrums."

"She never hit you, though," the younger hunter pointed out.

"No, but she bit me once. Point is, it took some time, but she got over it. I think time is all your brother needs. After all, you said he opened up to you recently, right?"

Sam shrugged. "I guess."

"Maybe that's all he needs."

The man nodded, sliding off his bar stool and kicking at the dust. "Thanks, Ellen."

"Anytime, Sam. Listen, you have any more trouble, you boys come right on back, you hear me? You're welcome anytime."

"Thanks again," he muttered, "but we really need to get going." He walked toward the pool table, figuring Ash would probably know where his brother had gotten to, but stopped short as something in one of the back rooms crashed loudly into the floor.

"What on earth is that girl doing back there?" Ellen asked herself.

"Dean?" Sam called, looking around the dimly lit bar. No sign of his brother. "Hey, Ash, have you seen Dean?"

The former MIT student sat up groggily and looked around. "In the back with Jo."

"Thanks," Sam nodded, heading off down the hallway. Well, that certainly explained the banging and crashing noises that had been issuing from the room for the past ten minutes. Leave it to Dean to totally piss Jo off.

He got to the back room, down at the end of the hallway, and knocked lightly, not really wanting to disrupt the fight that he imagined was going on. He leaned his head against the cool wood, looking down at the flowered sign that read 'Jo's Room,' and sighed.

"Dean, come on," he said, opening the door, "time to go." He stopped abruptly in the doorway, eyes darting over the scene. No one was there. The room was empty. A complete mess, but empty. "Dean?"

A sandy head popped up, a large smile planted on the elder hunter's face. "In a minute, Sam," he said, ducking back behind the bed. After a few seconds, he popped back up, stumbling into his jeans, shirt held loosely in his teeth. "So, you ready?"

Sam gaped, unable to believe what he was seeing as Dean pulled up his pants and, fly still unzipped, belt still unbuckled, staggered from the room. The younger man once more searched the room, this time to find Jo's head sticking up from behind the bed. "Give a girl a little privacy, will ya?" she barked before disappearing again.

Sammy ran down the hallway and into the bar to find Ellen and Ash staring at him. "Seriously," Ash questioned as the hunter headed out the door, "what the _hell_?"

o0o0o0o0o

It had been quiet in the car, with Dean driving and Sam staring at him for nearly five minutes. It didn't take long for Dean's goofy grin to fade, though, and even less time for him to slam on the brakes and bring the car to a screeching halt. "Holy crap!"

Sam jumped and averted his gaze. "What?"

"What did I just do?" Dean asked, apparently coming out of whatever stupor he'd been in since leaving Harvelle's.

Sam sighed. "Jo."

Dean shook his head. "That's impossible."

"I wouldn't believe it either, if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. Man, what were you _thinking_?"

"I dunno. I just felt like-"

"Like banging the next thing that moved?"

"No," he shook his head again. "I dunno. Just…" he trailed off, suddenly confused, worried, and a little scared. It didn't make sense. Normally, doing anything with a pretty girl could make him happy, even if he happened to know that girl personally.

"You all right?" Sam asked.

Dean glanced at his brother, fully intending to flash a charming, reassuring smile. As he met Sam's gaze, though, he felt another wave of concern rush through him, along with a sudden bout of uncharacteristic honesty. "No."

"You want to talk about it?"

The elder tore his eyes away from his sibling. "What do you think?" he demanded, putting the car in gear and driving away.

Sam sighed, turning to stare out the window, not noticing the way that his brother's knuckles whitened as he gripped the steering wheel tighter, a physical display of the younger man's annoyance.

* * *

Just a final thought on this one: I DON'T approve of Dean and Jo. Dean and Ellen, maybe. Dean and Sam, maybe. Dean and Jo, no way in Hell!

So, still eager to read:)


	3. Chapter 2

I'm totally in love with the fact that I'm not the only one who opposes Dean getting with Jo. Basically, I'd only support it if the relationship ended with her on the ceiling. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen in this story. So sad.

Thanks for all the positive, anti-Jo reviews :)

* * *

The diner was small, the only employees a burly waitress and a red-faced chef. Dust was collecting in piles in the corners of the building, and various small bugs scurried across the floor, all racing for the kitchen, trying to get there first to find the best crumbs. The two customers, brothers, watched the race with mild interest, the elder rooting for what appeared to be a roach with only three legs, while his brother cheered on the tiny centipede.

The diner was quiet, the only noises the scurrying of the insects and the sizzling of the grill. "You're sure you're all right?" Sam asked for the fifth time since they'd arrived.

Dean turned from the race, frowning as he watched his favorite to win suddenly lose an antennae. "Look, Sam," he grinned, "I'm a womanizer. It's what I do. I'm never going to stop doing it, no matter what. I'm sorry if that bothers you."

Sam rolled his eyes, but accepted the answer. Truth be told, he'd been a little freaked out by his brother's silent, broody episode in the car. It just wasn't like Dean to sulk, especially after spending time with a member of the opposite sex.

That was another thing that bothered Sam, as long as we're being completely honest. Ever since they'd met, Jo had been all over Dean, practically fawning. Dean, needless to say, had been a little preoccupied with his own issues and hadn't paid attention. In fact, there were times when he had gone out of his way to avoid her. So why suddenly take an interest?

Sammy leaned back in his chair and began to ponder, just as a resounding crash came from the kitchen and Dean fell out of his seat, a muffled grunt escaping his lips. "Son of a bitch!"

"What?" Sam asked, holding out a hand to help his brother to his feet.

Dean struggled up into a sitting position on the floor, holding his right arm and biting his lip. "Burns like hell," he responded, as if the answer made all the sense in the world.

"What are you talking about?"

Before Dean could even open his mouth the reply, the waitress came running out of the kitchen, her face flushed, hands trembling. "I don't suppose either of you two knows first aid?"

"Yeah, why?" the elder asked, finally getting to his feet, still favoring his right arm.

"It's Mike," she explained hurriedly, grabbing Sam's hand and pulling him back into the kitchen, Dean tagging along behind, "our chef. A pot slipped while he was making pasta, burned his right arm all up. Think you can help?"

Sammy nodded, asking her quickly for a towel. He turned to his brother, about to ask him to grab the first aid kit from the car, but found him gone.

o0o0o0o

Dean slid in behind the wheel of the Impala and closed his eyes, gingerly rubbing his sore arm. He started the car and flipped on the radio, letting the mind-numbing rock rush over him.

He could feel the invisible burn on his arm throb with each harried beat of his heart. Why did it hurt, why was he panicking? He'd been hurt worse than this before, had been electrocuted by his own stupidity, been gutted by a demon, nearly died at the hands of a beautiful reaper. So, why was this particular injury so terrifying?

oo0o0o0o

"You could have at least brought the kit in," Sam muttered as they stumbled into the lobby of a run-down motel, "that guy really could have used the help."

"Yeah, well, guess I didn't hear you," Dean replied gruffly, pulling out that week's credit card and passing it over the counter to the middle-aged clerk.

"King or two queens?"

"Two queens," he answered, glancing angrily at Sam as a little girl ran into the lobby crying.

"Jacki, honey," the clerk cooed, walking from behind the counter and dropping to her knees beside the child, "what happened?"

"Joey stoled my dolly," Jacki yelled loudly, making it apparent to everyone in the room that her tears were neither those of sorrow nor joy, "make him give her back!"

Dean swallowed, turning away from the child and her mother, who was trying desperately to calm her down, and towards Sam, who was apparently very uncomfortable witnessing the whole situation. The elder understood, it was an intimate moment between family, but that hardly gave Sammy permission to slink toward the door and out to the car. "Don't you walk away," he warned, feeling that now-familiar anger rising up again.

"What?"

"I said, don't walk away."

"Dude, what's your problem?"

Dean shook his head, trying unsuccessfully to escape the sudden, unbidden anger. "_My_ problem? You're the one getting ready to walk out and _I'm _the one with the problem?" His voice was rising steadily, causing the mother to momentarily ignore her own child's angry complaints, but he couldn't help it. _Where is this coming from?_

"I wasn't going to leave," Sam said softly, as if speaking to a small child who was having a tantrum in the middle of a crowded supermarket. It had taken him a couple of weeks, but he had finally started to understand the sudden mood swings and incessant anger that had recently begun radiating from his brother at all times. "I was just getting out of their way."

"Sure you were, College Boy," Dean snapped as the clerk hugged her daughter and his anger finally began to inexplicably ebb, "I'm not falling for that one again. You were just trying to get out of dad's way, too, weren't you? I remember."

"I'm not going back to Stanford," the younger said, finally beginning to understand what the rant was about, "I'm not leaving again until this de-" he glanced at the mother and daughter- "until this _thing_ is gone. Got it?"

Dean blinked, shaking his head, as the little girl skipped from the room and yelled for her brother. Just as suddenly as it had appeared, the rage was gone, and he was left looking at his very concerned brother. "I'm sorry," he muttered, stalking from the room.

"So am I," the clerk smiled, turning to Sam," kids, you know?"

"Yeah," the hunter nodded, looking out the window as Dean leaned up against the car and scrubbed a hand over his face.

o0o0o0o0o

Warm water ran over his body in small streams, falling from a slightly clogged and rusted showerhead. He'd locked himself in the bathroom, effectively avoiding his brother, as soon as he'd gotten into the room. Now he stood in the shower, trying desperately to clear his muddled head.

"What's happening to me?" he asked, running his hands through his short hair and spitting out the water that had started to pool in his mouth. Ever since his father's death he'd felt so angry, but then he'd finally broken down, finally told Sammy everything (well, almost everything) and then he'd just felt kind of empty. Empty, but somehow even more conflicted. It wasn't a good feeling.

He hung his head, letting his eyes slide shut, letting the quickly cooling water run over him as the confusion and concern that had plagued him off and on all day slowly faded, giving way to understanding and a kind of guarded happiness.

"Seriously," Dean demanded, unable to keep an awkward smile off his face as he flipped off the water with a quick snap of his wrist, "what the _hell_?"


	4. Chapter 3

Honestly, I think this is the most reviews I've ever gotten this early in a story. Ever. Thank you so so much.

Oh, and for those of you wondering about my speed in updating... well, let's say I'm not as fast a writer as you might think. I get the whole story finished (or almsot finished) and then I post it up, one chapter a day. I find that it's easier to keep people reading that way. No month-long breaks between chapters. :)

* * *

Sam couldn't help but grin as he closed the laptop. It was so perfect, gave him so much power over his big brother. It was almost too good to be true. He couldn't wait to tell Dean, just to see the older man's reaction, if nothing else.

His smile widened as the bathroom door opened, sending a rolling ball of steam up toward the ceiling. "What are you so happy about?" Dean asked as he pulled on an old t-shirt, his own smile never fading.

"Could ask you the same thing."

"Don't know," the elder shrugged, "just happy I guess. Why?'

It was Sammy's turn to shrug. "It just seems like you've been kinda moody lately, that's all. I mean, after the zombie hunt I guess I thought things would get better."

Dean flopped down on his bed and closed his eyes, still grinning. "It is better, it's just that there's something going on…" he trailed off, happiness never fading as he began to wonder about the day's second sudden bout of honesty.

"Do you know what?"

The elder shook his head. "Just haven't really felt like myself lately."

Sam nodded. "Well, while you were hanging out in the shower for an hour and a half, I did some digging."

"Digging?"

"Research."

"Research?"

"Yes, Dean. _Research_."

"What'd you research?" Dean asked, "I didn't think this place had a history."

"It doesn't. I was, uh, looking up something different."

"And what, pray tell, were you looking up?"

Sam sighed, his smile finally fading. "Uh… it's called psychic empathy."

"What?" the elder asked, opening his eyes and sitting up to face Sam, that foreign happiness finally fading away and making room for something else. His stomach did a flip as he met his sibling's eyes, his insides twisting into nervous knots and his palms suddenly wet with fear.

"It's kind of like telepathy," Sammy explained, "only with feelings instead of thoughts."

"And you were researching this because…?"

Sam averted his eyes, glancing down at his hands, then at the wall, then at his shoes, before they finally stopped to rest on the closed laptop. "You have to admit," he muttered softly, his voice almost lost in the drone of the air conditioner that had finally turned on, "it makes sense."

"What makes sense?"

"These mood swings of yours aren't normal."

"Well, excuse for being a little emotionally unstable lately."

"No," Sam finally met his brother's eyes again, "at first it was understandable. I was kinda mad, too. But today…"

"Wait a minute," Dean asked, sliding off the bed and beginning to pace, wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans, "are you trying to tell me that you actually think-?"

"Jo's always been interested in you," Sammy explained quickly, the words tumbling from his mouth faster than his mind could form them, "but you never really cared about her, at least not like that. But today… what you did… and then the cook in the diner…"

"I'll admit the whole Jo thing was weird, but what's that got to do with a clumsy chef?"

"Dean, you hurt you arm," the younger pointed out, "just like Mike. It's too big of a coincidence to just brush off. And what about that outburst in the lobby, huh?"

"I was kind of hoping you'd forgotten-"

"And that honesty. You _never_ tell me _anything_. I have to pressure you just to get the time of day-"

"When was I so completely honest with you?"

"Just now. Five minutes ago. You admitted something was bugging you. You actually talked to me about it. That's not normal. _I'm_ the honest one, remember?"

"So, what, just because I decide to tell the truth for once in my life, that suddenly makes me psychic?"

Sam sighed, pulling his eyes away again. "It makes sense," he repeated.

"No," Dean shot back, "it doesn't. _You're_ the freak with the psychic powers. Not me." He turned to walk out the door, to get some fresh air, when he felt it. Like someone stabbing him in the heart. "I'm just a _normal_ freak," he added as he pulled open the door and walked out into the strong sunlight.

o0o0o0o0o

A cool autumn breeze blew through the changing trees, sending colored leaves swirling along the cement path in the tiny green park. Dean closed his eyes, letting the wind whip around his face, blowing through his short air. It was nice to finally get away from the hustle and bustle of the small town, nice to truly feel like himself again for the first time that day.

He walked with his hands in his pockets, Sam's words running endlessly through his mind, basically telling him that he was a freak, that there was something wrong with him, that they were, essentially, in the same boat now.

That wasn't what had him worried, though. No, it was the fact that the concern had faded almost as soon as he'd walked out of the motel room, taking that stabbing pain of betrayal in his heart along with it.

Maybe Sam was right. Maybe there _was_ something going on with him.

He sighed, hunkering down against the rapidly cooling breeze, his mind racing. _Why now? Why not when I was 22? That's the pattern, isn't it? And how come I get stuck with something stupid? Max Miller could toss a person across a room without breaking a sweat, and I get to experience the emotional roller coaster of everyone I meet? If Sam's right, that is… which he's not. Because I'm not like him. He's the special one. He's the one who needs me as personal security. I can't have him worrying about my next freak-out._

Dean straightened back up, the cool breeze suddenly not seeming so cool anymore. It was warm. Not too hot, not too cold, but comfortable. He looked around the park. There was a family sitting near the trail, eating a picnic lunch. Two parents and a little boy. They were happy, all smiling and laughing, and their smiles became contagious as the hunter felt himself becoming encased in comfort and warmth. For the first time since his mother's death, he actually felt safe. Safe, and warm, and wanted.

He walked over to a bench, his eyes darting over the family, and sat down. He let himself relax, leaning his head back and basking in whatever seemed to be radiating off the people. He drank it in, warmth and safety and comfort and belonging and happiness, just let it flow through him and fill every hole that life had left within him.

And he felt wanted. He hadn't really felt wanted since Sam had started to drift away at the ripe old age of ten, had felt even worse when he'd left for college. And then there was that day in the motel room, the day when Dean woke up and his father was gone. He'd waited for two weeks for John to get back before going to find Sam, and even then the younger man hadn't wanted him. He'd moved on. They all had. Everyone but Dean.

He sat on the bench, letting the feeling wash over him, finally deciding that Sammy was right about him. He was a freak. That didn't mean that he couldn't enjoy what he'd suddenly discovered that he had, though. Maybe a couple of weird outbursts were worth it if he could only feel like this some of the time.

_Some_ being the key word there. Because, even though he didn't see it happen, he knew the little boy had broken his arm. Dean could handle the pain, he'd grown up with pain. The boy sitting on the checkered tablecloth, however, couldn't.

o0o0o0o0o

Sam looked up as soon as the door burst open and Dean came stumbling in, clutching his left arm, eyes red, tears streaming down his face. "Find a way to fix it," he growled.


	5. Chapter 4

Say, you guys aren't waiting for an update or anything are you? Well, I'm happy to oblige!

* * *

"I thought you said you knew how to fix it," Dean complained as he sat behind the wheel of his car, staring past Sam's head at the modest little house.

"I told you I knew _someone _who _might_ be able to _help_," the younger man clarified, stepping out of the car and into the cool breeze. He glanced around the familiar neighborhood, memories flooding back as the driver's side door slammed shut.

"You know she hates me."

"She doesn't hate you."

"Hey," Dean argued, joining his brother at the front of the driveway, "who's the empath here? She hates me."

"The last time we were here," Sam began, starting toward the house.

"She threatened me with a spoon," the elder interrupted.

"You put your muddy boots on her table."

"Did not. I just thought about it. Thinking isn't the same as doing, dude."

Sam shook his head. "Whatever. I should have just made you come alone. I could use the time off."

"You know you're worried about me," Dean countered, "and guess what? I know it, too. Besides, we could probably crash here until we get this thing figured out, if you _really_ need that vacation."

"I thought she hated you."

"_Me,_ she hates. _You_, she adores."

The front door opened just as Sammy raised his hand to knock, revealing a smiling woman. "Dean Winchester," she scolded, "you know I don't play favorites."

Dean felt his face redden as he averted his eyes from the psychic and a bitter thought (_you might not, but dad sure did_) ran unbidden through his mind.

The smile on Missouri Mosley's face faded as the same thought raced through her own mind. "Come on in," she sighed, stepping aside to allow the boys entrance, "and tell me what brings you here."

The shorter man sighed, stepping quickly into the house and trying to avoid the psychic's face. He really didn't want to be there, didn't want anyone else to find out about the newest chapter in the Winchester Book of Weirdness. Less than a foot into the small sitting room, though, he abruptly changed his mind.

The pleasant mixture of warmth and comfort and safety hit him all at once, harder than it had in the park, completely engulfing him and washing away any doubt or anxiety. He swallowed hard, trying to hide what was going on, trying to make it look like he was all right. He plopped down into a chair, careful to keep his feet planted firmly on the floor, and sighed again as his brother took the chair next to him.

"So," Missouri smiled, her eyes resting on Dean, seeming to know that he was suddenly content, "what brings you back to Lawrence?"

The older man shifted in his seat, still attempting to project an air of discomfort and failing miserably. "Nothing much," he shrugged, "just thought we'd pop by for a visit."

The psychic rolled her eyes. "Boy, you can't fool me. You should know that by now. _You_ came back because _it_ came back and you want some answers."

The brothers exchanged a glance, both a little confused. "I don't know what you're talking about," Sam began, "but Dean-"

"Has been a little overly emotional lately?" she interrupted, "that's why you're here. But I have to tell you boys, this isn't exactly a recent development."

"It's not?" Dean asked, "because I think I would have noticed…"

"Don't question me, boy," the psychic snapped, "just shut up and listen. This new talent of yours, the ability to read people like that, isn't new. You've been able to do it your whole life. You just forgot."

"I'm pretty sure I would remember-"

She reached across the table that separated them, and swatted at him, causing the hunter to jump before leaning back into the soft chair. "I told you not to interrupt me. Don't make me get my spoon."

Dean held up his hands in surrender, not really in the mood to get whacked, and waited for her to continue.

"That's better. Boy's got some sense.

"Anyway, this ability of yours has always been there, just hidden a bit. The first time I met you, when you were about four or five, I could sense it. Never did tell your daddy. Got the sense you didn't want me to."

"Why wouldn't he want you to do that?" Sam asked, realizing that Dean would obviously want to know but wasn't exactly in a good position to ask.

Missouri shrugged. "Damned if I know. But it was important to him. I was pretty surprised when you came back, twenty-some years later, completely shut off from the rest of the world."

"Do you know why?" Sam questioned, glancing over at his brother, who didn't really seem to be paying attention. He was just sitting in the chair, his body relaxed, eyes closed, with a small smile playing across his face. Posture didn't match situation, and it was starting to worry the younger man.

"As far as I can tell," she shrugged again, "he did it himself. Things like that don't just go away on their own. They're chased off."

"Makes sense," Dean muttered, never changing his position, not even bothering to open his eyes, "I mean, who on earth would want to live like this?"

Missouri smiled. "Well, it looks to me like you'll have to, at least until you can figure out what you did last time."

That got his attention. "What?"

"You heard me. I can't do anything to help you out. You're going to have to figure this out on your own."

"But… but…"

She saw the look in his eyes, heard the desperation in his voice, and suddenly knew that it wasn't all about getting things back to normal. It was about wanting to stay, wanting to spend just a few more minutes wrapped in that sense of belonging that had evaded him since he was a child.

"If you want me to help you control it, though," she conceded, smiling as he relaxed, "you could stay."

"Here?" he asked, leaning forward in his chair, his brother eyeing him suspiciously.

"I've got a couple of empty rooms," the psychic nodded, "and if you promise to wipe your feet I'm sure we can work something out."

Relief flooded the hunter's features as he relaxed, running a nervous hand through his hair. "Sounds like a plan," he muttered, turning to his brother, "Sammy, go get the bags from the trunk."

Sam headed out of the room, shaking his head, hair flapping in his eyes, taking the hint that his brother wanted some alone time with the more experienced psychic.

"So," Dean began slowly, looking out the window as his brother neared the car, "you knew I was a freak and didn't tell me?"

Missouri smiled. "You're not a freak, Dean. You're special. There aren't any freaks among freaks. You should know that by now."

He shook his head, finally tearing his eyes from the window and the image of Sam struggling with the bags. "You'd think that's the kind of thing a person would remember."

"You'd think."

"Why now? Why go away for twenty years and then suddenly pop up for no apparent reason? It just doesn't make sense."

"Sure it does," she reasoned, "if you just think about it."

He looked up, meeting her eyes for the first time since arriving, feeling that sense of comfort and belonging wash over him again. "I've thought about it," he admitted, "and I still don't get it."

"How'd you feel after your daddy's death?" the psychic asked suddenly, holding his gaze, "you feel sad? Alone? Angry? Betrayed? You feel like he gave up everything so that you could go on living?"

Dean shrugged. "At first, I guess."

"At first," Missouri nodded, "but then you started thinking. It was awful convenient for him, wasn't it? You can claim that what he did was noble until the cows come home, but you'd be lying. He took the coward's way out. Not out of life, but out of death."

_"Sam… is clearly John's favorite."_

Dean shuddered. "He didn't want to have to do it himself," he muttered, still staring the older woman in the eyes, "he didn't want to have to murder his favorite son, so he made me do it instead. He didn't even give me a choice."

"That anger built up some more until you finally told Sam, didn't it?" A nod. "And then what?"

"And then nothing. It was gone. I wasn't mad anymore, wasn't even scared. I'm gonna have to kill my brother."

"Yes," she agreed, "but at least now you'll know for sure when the time comes."

Dean stared at her, blinking a couple of times. "What?"

"You heard me, boy. This thing of yours is back for a reason."

"And you think that's it? Because I want to know if my brother's evil or not?"

"That's part of it," she explained, "part of it is you. It's a subconscious thing, Dean. You wanted to know what was going on with Sam and now you do. But at the same time you didn't want to feel like that anymore. You didn't want to be empty like that. You didn't want to feel like yourself anymore, and now you don't have to."

The hunter finally broke eye contact, standing up and stretching before heading for the door to help Sam with the luggage. "That's crazy," he muttered, "how could you know that?"

"Same way I know why you want to stay here so bad," she replied softly, "I'm psychic."


	6. Chapter 5

Quick author's note concerning last chapter: Dean believes that his father wouldn't lie to him, so when daddy says 'if you can't save him, kill him' it means that Sammy will, inevitably, turn evil. Just one more reason John Winchester should not have been allowed to raise children.

Now, concerning this chapter: italics dream/flashback.

Read on, happy reviewers... er, I mean, readers.

Yes, read on, happy readers... :)_

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_He woke up screaming, his lips dry, mouth parched, body drenched in sweat. For a minute, Dean didn't realize where he was. The room was clean and smelled of old pine and smoke, and badly drawn pictures adorned the white walls. He pushed away the brightly colored covers from the bed he was sitting on, gazing around the room. It was so familiar._

_"Of course it's familiar," he reasoned, "it's…" He trailed off, wrapping a small hand around his throat, wondering what was wrong with his voice. _Small? _He pulled his hand back, examining it in the soft light thrown by a lamp that sat atop a dresser at the other end of the room. _Small. _The hand of a child._

_Before Dean even had time to wonder whether or not he was dreaming, the lamp in the room began to flicker, plunging the room into darkness for a couple of seconds before lighting it again with a cheery glow. Small or not, he knew what that meant, knew that something was wrong._

_He slid off the bed, swept with a sense of falling in the time that it took his feet to hit the ground, and crept towards the door. He was almost there when it began. Burning, searing pain drawing its way across his stomach, causing him to double over by the door, clutching weakly at his middle, trying to stop the pain._

_Dean crawled closer to the door, biting back a scream. It felt like someone was cutting him open, slicing right across the stomach, _gutting_ him._

_And then the real burning started._

o0o0o0o0o

Missouri watched from the hallway as Dean twisted and turned in his sleep, pushing the heavy quilt that lay on top of him onto the floor and moaning softly.

o0o0o0o0o

_He padded down the hall, his entire body engulfed by exploding pain, as if he were on fire. The world tilted before him, making him dizzy. He looked around him, recognizing the old house in Lawrence, but not really taking it in. All that Dean knew was that he had to reach the flickering light at the end of the hallway that led to his brother's room. Someone, most likely Sammy, would be in there, and maybe he could get answers. Maybe, and it was a big maybe, he could find his parents, alive and well and willing to take that pain away._

_What he found was a baby being shoved into his arms. What he found was the dissipation of fear, which was replaced by the incessant need to get out of the house, the need to bury his head in his arms and cry, the need to go back into that room and save something._

_That was when he knew, when Dean realized exactly where he was. _Boy, nightmares suck_, he thought, wrapping too-small arms around his brother and carrying the baby out of the house. Hell, pulling Sam out of burning buildings was getting to be a regular occurrence for him._

_It didn't take long to get the kid out of the house and into the yard, that bitter determination and sense of loss burning into him even as comfort and soft warmth radiated from the baby in his arms. He looked down at the bundle, eyeing his brother. It had been a day since he'd done Jo in the back room of Harvelle's, and he'd never felt that kind of thing from Sam before. From the family in the park and Missouri, sure, but not Sammy._

_"So what is it?" he asked himself quietly, hugging the bundle closer and marveling at the increasing strength of whatever he was picking up from the kid, "what is it?"_

_Sam just gurgled softly as their father came running out of the house and scooped the boys up in his arms, carrying them away from danger as the nursery window exploded in a burst of broken glass and rolling flames._

_John ducked down behind the car with his boys in his arms, a single tear slipping down his cheek as Dean turned to look up at him, every feeling of warmth and comfort gone. Now he was only cold. Cold and sad and angry. That anger burned like the fire, getting brighter and hotter and stronger as they sat behind the car and sirens grew near. And it would only get worse._

o0o0o0o

Dean sat up in bed, cold sweat cascading down his face and falling into the floral-print sheets. His heart was pounding, his teeth were chattering, and his whole body shook with rage.

"What was that?" he whispered, balling his fists in his lap. No ordinary nightmare. A memory? Weird as hell, and half as scary. What was up with that last, resonating bit, anyway? That anger that just wouldn't going away. He was still feeling it, still consumed.

And he was scared. Dean Winchester didn't have nightmares, and he certainly never jumped awake in the middle of the night, mind reeling, body trembling. No, that was Sammy's thing. It happened to Sam all the time, and when it did, Dean was always there for him. He would go sit on his brother's bed and grab his shoulders and tell him it was all right. And Sam would go back to sleep, safe and sound, with big brother watching over him.

Sometimes Dean regretted being the oldest, like when he woke up in the middle of the night with a sheen of sweat on his forehead, his fists balled in rage. Yeah, he could really use the comfort. Honestly, it wouldn't be that hard to calm him down, given his current state. _Just think happy thoughts and Dean'll pick up on 'em right off._

He sighed, laying back down, anger finally rolling away to be replaced by whatever seemed to be flowing through the house. And he wasn't scared anymore. He wasn't mad. He wasn't shaking, or shivering, or even wondering what was wrong with him. He was loved, and…

_Oh, crap_. He sat up again, eyes wide, that warm, happy feeling being replaced by his own slight panic. _No, it couldn't be… could it?_ No, it wasn't. If it was, then he would have felt it before, would have gotten it off Sam. His brother loved him, right?


	7. Chapter 6

Thanks again for all of the great reviews. You have no idea how much I appreciate it. I honestly didn't think this story would attract many (read 'any') readers. Thanks so much!

Oh, and for everyone who saw last night's episode: OMG! HOW AWESOME WAS THAT?!?!?!?

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Bacon and eggs. He would have preferred pancakes, to tell the truth, but Dean had made bacon and eggs. Why Dean had bothered to get up and cook breakfast in the first place, Sammy didn't know. That didn't really matter, though, because it had been a while since he'd had a meal that hadn't been preheated at a convenience store.

He sat down at the circular table, pulling his chair in and watching as Dean made up a couple of plates. "Any reason you made breakfast?" he asked, glancing down at the heaps of food piled on the plate in front of him.

"Well," Dean shrugged, "we got free room and board for once, so I figured it wouldn't hurt to give a little something back."

"Who are you and what have you done with my brother?"

Dean smirked as he sat down across from his brother, pushing his eggs around with a fork. "Don't look at me," he said, "it's your pansy emo vibes that've got me so messed up."

Sam just shook his head and turned back to his breakfast. He could feel Dean's eyes on him, knew that his brother was watching him. He waited a couple of minutes before finally addressing the slightly awkward situation. "Uh, you all right?"

Dean jumped, startled. "Huh? Yeah. Thinking."

Sam nodded. "I can see how that would distract you, but, you know, you shouldn't be so afraid of new things. Thinking is _good_."

Dean snorted and flicked a spoonful of scrambled eggs in his brother's direction. "Oops," he said, his voice sliding up an octave or two, "did your easily offended inner child make me do that?"

"Oh, that is it," Sammy said, picking up a large handful of bacon from the plate in the middle of the table, "you're going down, emo."

"Me? Emo? I'm not the one who cried when we went to see 'House of Wax.'"

"That girl was seriously upset about the death of her boyfriend," Sam defended, still holding the bacon in his hand, "she wasn't expecting to see him like that."

"What, she thought he was gonna come waltzing out and whisk her off to happily ever after? The guy went inside the killer's house at the beginning of the movie to take a leak and two hours later she expected him to be alive?"

"She deserved a happy ending."

"She should have seen it coming. Besides, the guy who played the boyfriend is always the first one offed in horror movies."

"It's not his fault," Sam said, "he's just an easy target."

"Yeah, I hear a couple of years in Star's Hollow will do that to a guy."

"He… wait. You watch 'Gilmore Girls?'"

"Do you?" The brothers started at each other over the table for a while before Dean finally decided to speak again. "Uh, you gonna throw that at me or let it drip grease all over?"

Sammy cleared his throat, setting the handful of bacon back on the plate. "This conversation never happened."

The elder nodded. "Agreed. But we can still talk about 'Grey's' on Thursdays, right?"

"How did you… never mind."

Dean smirked. "I _knew_ you liked that show. Man, I'm good. So, who's your favorite, Izzie, Meredith, Callie, or the chief's wife?"

"Personally," a voice from the doorway answered, "I'm a fan of the chief's wife. But Sammy here likes Izzie. Thinks she's cute." Sam blushed as Missouri entered the room and took a seat at the table. "No need to be embarrassed, though," she assured, "at least you didn't cry like a baby the day Denny died."

Sam's eyes widened as Dean ducked his head. "No way."

The empath shrugged, rubbing a hand along the back of his neck. "He was ok," he muttered, "kinda reminded me of dad, you know?."

"We gonna drop it now?" Sam asked.

"We're gonna drop it, yeah."

o0o0o0o0o

Sam spent the day in front of his laptop, staring at the glowing screen, looking up everything he could on empathy and taking notes. He was constantly aware of Dean, sitting on the other side of Missouri's library and leafing through some old books. Dean, who wasn't really looking at the pages so much as he was Sam's back.

"You mind?" Sammy finally asked, starting to feel a little nervous. On the other side of the room, he heard Dean jump, the springs in the chair creaking with the shift in weight. _Serves you right_, he though bitterly.

"Sorry," Dean muttered, squirming in his seat, annoyance flooding his system, "just thinking again, I guess."

Sam nodded. "You want to know if Alexis Bledel is gonna sign on for another season, right?"

"I thought we dropped that. And no, I'm more worried about the mom. She's the fun one."

"So, there's another reason you've been staring at the back of my head for the past hour and a half?"

Dean cleared his throat. Had it been that long? He'd lost track of time, trying to focus on whatever was going on inside that stupid emo heart that seemed to control Sam's life. "Remember when you were six and scared of the thing under the bed? Every motel room we went to, you had me check before you would go to sleep."

Sammy nodded. "Yeah, I guess I remember that. Any reason you're bringing it up now?"

"You never let dad check. Said it had to be me."

"I asked dad once and he gave me a gun and told me to aim for the heart. Why?"

Dean shrugged. "Just wondering." He dropped his head to the book in his lap, eyes skimming the pages without really taking anything in.

It shouldn't have been so damn hard. Sam was always so upfront with his feelings, so eager to share, so why couldn't Dean get anything but a mixture of interest and annoyance off the kid?

Why was he even trying? He knew his brother loved him. Loved him like his parents had. Like his mother, who had walked right past him to talk to Sam. Like his father, who had confessed to liking Sammy better before telling Dean to kill the kid.

_That_ was why he was trying. He had to know. Had to know if Sam was just like everyone else, just putting up a front until the time came to let the truth be known. The only problem was that there wasn't any warmth there, no happiness, just worry. And that was worrying.


	8. Chapter 7

Well, looks like it's time for another update. Have I mentioned yet how much I love the fact that people are actually reading and reviewing? Becuase it's totally awesome :)_

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_He walked through the snow, brisk wind blowing around him, chilling him to the bone. He looked back at Sammy, who had fallen back into the snow and was busy rolling around, making snow angels. A flood of happiness rolled off the boy, and Dean smiled._

_"Come on, kiddo," he sighed, walking back to where his brother lay in the snow, "time for school. You don't want to be late on the first day after the break."_

_Sammy reluctantly climbed back to his feet and wiped himself off. "I wish break was longer."_

_"So do I," the elder boy agreed. He hated school, hated any kind of crowd. The classrooms were bad, but school-wide assemblies were worse. Too many people, all antsy and jumpy and excited. He couldn't sit still, couldn't keep quiet, and spent a lot of time in the principal's office because of it._

_The large brick building loomed up ahead of them, heating system sending large billows of smoke into the sky. "Dean," Sammy began, clutching his brother's hand with worn mittens, "why does daddy make us walk to school?"_

_"He's busy," Dean explained, "you know that."_

_"Yeah, but it's so cold. I can't feel my nose."_

_"You'll warm up when we get inside," the older boy stated, pulling his own thin coat more tightly around himself. They got a lot of second-hand stuff lately, especially after their father's last poltergeist hunt. The noisy spirit had gone straight for the weapons compartment in the trunk, and only a few knives and guns had come out unscathed. Most of their money had gone to restocking the trunk._

_People milled around outside the school, parents in big vans dropping their kids off, buses pulling up and unloading. Dean could feel them all, the bus drivers who were worried about the icy roads, the parents who were glad to get a little peace and quiet, the kids who were depressed the moment they stepped foot on school grounds._

_He pulled into himself, a trick he was just starting to get the hang of. He couldn't maintain whatever weak mental block he'd produced for long, but if it kept the other people out for a little while, he didn't really care._

_A couple of teachers were standing outside the front doors as the brothers approached, watching the morning routine. "Look," one of them whispered, pointing at the shivering boys, "what kind of parent would make their child walk to school in this kind of weather?"_

_"They just moved in a couple of weeks ago," the other teacher explained quietly, "live in a motel room. I hear the dad's a drunk."_

_Dean dropped his gaze as he walked past, but that couldn't keep them out, couldn't mask the sympathy that rolled off of them in waves, flooding his system, making him want to cry._

_"Hey, boys," the first teacher, a young woman with raven hair, began, "how would you like to come into the teacher's lounge with me for some hot cocoa?"_

_Sammy smiled, always happy to be included, but Dean just kept his head down. This kind of thing had been going on for a while now, people trying to cover sympathy with kindness. "No thank you," he muttered, tightening his hand around his brother's and pulling the little boy away._

_"But I'm cold, Dean," Sam complained, trying to pull away._

_"I'll give you my coat when we get inside," Dean muttered, still pulling, suddenly hating the teachers for trying to turn his brother against him, for taking that warmth and love and happiness that he always felt when he was around Sammy and turning it into contempt and bitter anger._

_No, Dean didn't like school at all._

o0o0o0o0o

"You know," a soft voice said from behind him, pulling Dean from his memory, "flashing back is never a good thing."

The hunter turned around, tired eyes dropping to the ground before he could meet Missouri's gaze. "You saw that, huh?"

She nodded. "I did."

"Man, I don't even remember that happening. Don't remember the school or the town or the teachers. Why?"

"You blocked it out," she shrugged, "or, most of it, at least."

"But why now?"

"You tell me."

He sighed. "If a person asks a question, it usually means that they don't know the answer."

The psychic walked into the room and pulled up a chair beside him, gently closing the book in his lap. "You know your brother loves you."

He set the book on the floor and got up to leave. He wasn't ready to talk about it yet, to talk about his own doubts and insecurities. He had more important things to worry about, like saving Sam and keeping his own empathic ass out of harm's way.

That was when he felt it. Not sympathy, but close. Understanding. The want to help. He sat back down.

"He sure has a funny way of showing it."

She nodded. "He's been a little preoccupied lately. A demon has plans for him, his father's dead, his brother's been acting weird. He's got a lot on his mind."

Dean chuckled. "Yeah, well, so do I. I mean, out of everything out there, why did I have to get stuck with something that's not even useful, huh? There are kids out there that can toss people against walls and control minds and who knows what else. Hell, even Sammy isn't completely useless."

"You know," Missouri said softly, leaning forward in her chair, "this gift of yours isn't completely useless, either. It can work two ways."

"What do you mean?"

"Right now you're working as a receiver. You're picking up the emotions of everyone around you. You can work as a sender, too. It would take some work, but if you wanted to you could push these unwanted emotions onto other people."

"Go on."

She smiled. "I might not be able to help you get rid of this, but I can help you control it. If you can learn to use this, it can become an asset."

Dean nodded. "When do we start?"

o0o0o0o0o

Dean closed his eyes, letting the wind blow through his short hair, and pulled his jacket a little tighter around his body. He was starting to like parks. They seemed to be gathering places for children and families with so much happiness and love within them that it radiated out, filling the wide open space with a warmth and comfort that Dean hardly recognized.

There was a playground near-by, full of kids who were busily playing and climbing and running and jumping. There were parents sitting on the other benches, watching with apprehension, waiting for the inevitable scraped elbows and bruised knees. They were worried, but their worry was different that Sam's. It was lighter, happier, warmer. They didn't actually think anything bad would happen, didn't think that danger loomed.

It was nice.

It was gone. No more warm, happy anything. It wasn't cold, not exactly. Just… not as warm. Not as nice. It was worry. Different worry. Sam's worry.

"How'd you find me?"

"Missouri."

Dean cracked his eyes open to look at his little brother, who'd sat down beside him on the bench. "Figures."

"She says you're gonna try to get this under control."

"Is that a problem?"

Sammy shook his head, long hair flapping around his face. "No, it's just not what I expected."

Dean eyed his brother. "Oh, really? You jealous? Not feeling so special anymore?"

"You wish. What are you doing here, anyway?"

"You see those kids out there?" Dean asked, pointing at the playground equipment, "they're happy. That makes me happy. You see the parents on the benches? They're happy, too. That makes me even happier."

"So, you came out to the park to get a happy fix?"

Dean shrugged. "Pretty much."

"And how's that working out for you?"

"Actually, it was working pretty well until you and your little black cloud of angst came along and started raining on my happy parade."

"Cloud of angst?" Sam snorted, "man, you _are_ high. Come on, we should head out. Missouri's expecting you to make dinner."

Dean struggled to his feet, fighting back a yawn and stretching. "Yeah, all right, but you're helping."

"Fine," the younger man muttered, heading off down the concrete path that led out of the park and into the neighborhood where their psychic friend lived, "hey, can I ask you something?"

"Depends."

"Yesterday you were sure that Missouri hated you, so why suddenly opt to stay at her place? Answer honestly, now."

"Not like I really have a choice anyway," the empath muttered, "not with you hanging around, Mr. Open Book."

"Well?"

"It feels good, ok?"

"What feels good?"

"Her place."

"You want to stay at her house because it feels good?"

"Yes, all right?"

"Describe good."

"I don't know," the older hunter fumbled, "warm, happy, comfortable."

"That's it?"

"Safe." It was a low whisper, almost inaudible over the soft breeze.

Sam stopped. "What?" Dean just kept on down the path, hands shoved in his pockets, head down. Sammy watched him go, that word playing over and over in his mind. _Safe_. Why did it matter that the house felt safe? Didn't every place they went feel safe? Or was Sam the only one who got that sense?


	9. Chapter 8

Wow. 91 reviews. This is awesome!

Well, get ready for yet another chapter. Hope you're still enjoying everything :)

_

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Dean sat in the chair, face stoic, mind racing. It had been a week. Seven days. It had been a mistake. A slip-up. Things should have changed already, should have gone back to the way they were before, with dad still acting tough and mad but not really meaning it. Not really_ feeling_ it._

_It had been a week of anger and disappointment and fear. A week of avoiding his father but never quite outrunning that sinking feeling in his heart. He'd lashed out at Sammy twice, without meaning to, just because John had been in the room._

_And then dad had yelled again, scolded his oldest for shouting. 'Like father, like son' didn't seem to apply._

_Dean was getting sick of it, getting tired of it. He wasn't going to live like this anymore, feeling that constant pain, knowing that it was all his fault that his father was so angry and bitter and scared._

_He pushed open the door to his father's bedroom and found the man sitting at his desk, bent over his journal, ripping out pages and crumpling them up and throwing them away. "Dad?"_

_"What?"_

_Dean jumped at the harshness of the words, the way his father's voice cracked, the way the room got suddenly cold. "Um, I just tucked Sammy in. He wants to say good-night to you."_

_"Tell him it'll be a minute."_

_"Um, sir?"_

_"What?"_

_"I was just wondering…I mean, you never said if you found it or not. You killed it, right? It's never gonna hurt anyone again."_

_John sighed and pushed his chair out. "It's gone, Dean," he muttered, standing up and towering over the nine-year-old, "but not because I killed it. It's gone because you let it get away." He walked to the door, brushing past the boy, disappointment radiating from him and filling his son, making the boy's heart stop._

_"Dad?"_

_"It almost killed your brother," John hissed coldly, "and you let it get away." He walked from the room, closing the door behind him, purposely avoiding the desperate look in his son's eyes, the way they glazed over._

_Dean's knees buckled the moment his father walked out, his heart pounding, breath hitching in his chest. It wasn't just anger anymore. It wasn't just disappointment. It was worse, stronger, colder. His father _hated_ him._

_He crawled over to the trashcan, began digging through it, pulling out everything his father had thrown away. It was everything John had dug up on shtrigas, everything he knew about the life-sucking witches, and he was throwing it away._

_Clutching the papers to his chest, Dean shakily got to his feet and staggered from the room. He stumbled down the hallway to his own bedroom, still not sure whether or not he was glad that his father had put him and Sammy in separate rooms. He lurched inside and closed the door, leaning up against it and letting himself slide to the floor._

_He looked at the papers in his hands, suddenly sure of what he had to do. He closed his eyes, that now-familiar disappointment and anger and hatred flooding over him. He blocked it out. He fought it, fought it as hard as he could._

_He continued to fight it, struggling to get it out of his system, even as he went and placed his father's papers into his own journal, which had been a birthday gift from Sammy. He concentrated harder as he got into bed and slipped off to sleep, fought against every negative impulse that flooded his system._

_It hurt. Hurt his body and his mind. It made him ache, made him wish he didn't have to do it. Made him wish he had another choice. But he didn't. So he fought. And sometime, in the middle of the night, he won._

o0o0o0o0o

Dean moaned and rolled over, not even bothering to sit up and look around. He knew where he was, knew it was a dream, knew he was safe. He pulled the covers back up to his chin and sighed, letting the warmth of the house flood back through him, letting it comfort him in a way that nothing else possibly could.

o0o0o0o0o

Sam sat at the kitchen table, his hands hooked around a coffee mug, eyes staring into the deep brown liquid without really seeing it. _Safe._ What did that even mean? Didn't Dean feel safe?

Sam chuckled. What the hell kind of question was that? It's hard to feel safe when you don't have any legit money, when you don't know where your next meal's going to come from, when the bed you're sleeping in has been used by countless other individuals. It's hard to feel safe when you hunt down nightmares for a living. Hard to feel safe when your father pins you to a wall and tells you that he doesn't love you.

Apparently, though, it's easy to feel safe when you don't even feel like yourself anymore. Oh, yes, very easy. Even easier when you embrace it.

The hunter sighed, still staring into his coffee. He could feel eyes on him, assumed it was Dean again, and didn't even look up. "What's up with you?" he asked, annoyed.

"Well, excuse me," a very un-Dean-like voice replied, "but I'm not the one sitting at a kitchen table at one in the morning staring at cold coffee."

Sam jumped, turning around to see Missouri standing in the doorway to the kitchen. "You're not Dean."

"No, thank goodness. He's sound asleep, like you should be."

Sammy shook his head. "Can't sleep."

The psychic sat down across from him. "Anything you want to talk about?"

"Dean."

"Oh, honey, you're gonna have to be more specific or we could be up for hours."

"He said," Sam sighed, "he said he likes it here because…"

She smiled. "Because it feels safe."

"Yeah. That's what I don't get. I mean, am I missing something, or am I just not good enough for him anymore?"

"Funny," the psychic muttered, "he's been wondering the same thing about you."

"What?"

"This all happened for a reason, Sammy. He just wants to keep you safe and look out for you, and that's gonna be a little easier for him now."

"It's always been easy for him. It's what he does."

"There's more to it than that. You're dealing with your father's death, right? You're mourning, and it's getting better, right?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Is he?"

"Is he what? Mourning? No. Dean doesn't mourn. Not like other people."

She nodded. "He gets violent. He gets angry."

"He just doesn't know how to deal with it. He can't. He's gotta make sure I'm all right first, doesn't he?"

"Looks like you're not as clueless as your brother thinks you are."

Sammy grinned. "I'm gonna take that as a compliment." He turned back to his cold coffee, still feeling the other psychic's eyes on him. "So," he finally said, "this feeling of safety he's been picking up… he said there was more to it…"

"Warmth," Missouri nodded, "comfort, happiness. The whole nine yards. It's not just safety, Sam. It's love. I know it sounds clichéd, and it is, but it's the truth. It's the best protection from anything dark. I try to build it up inside my home, try to keep the place safe, and when someone like Dean comes along and picks up on it…"

"But why would that make him want to stay here? I mean, I… he knows that…"

"It's one thing to know something and another completely to experience it for yourself. He's spent so much time out in the cold world, he's desperate for warmth, and he'll get it anywhere he can now."

Sam hung his head, his bangs falling into his cup, and moaned.

"He'd like to get it from you, though," Missouri muttered, pushing her chair out and moving toward the doorway. "Don't stay up too late."

The young psychic pushed his cup away and lay his head in his hands, closing his eyes against a building headache. He loved his brother, he really did, but it was just hard to do anything but worry now. Things were spiraling. _Dean_ was spiraling. And the headache just kept getting worse.

o0o0o0o

Yellow eyes glinted in the dim light of the room as Sam watched the demon grow closer, its mouth twisting into a smile. It was halfway across the room, halfway to Sam, who stood pinned to the wall across from his brother, when it stopped.

The demon spun around, stalking up to Dean, its smile widening. It focused on his pale skin, ran a finger down his chest, laughed as the older hunter's breath hitched in his throat. "It's so cold, isn't it?" the demon asked, moving in closer, "and there's no escape. Nothing but death."

Still gasping, Dean raised his eyes to look at it. He moaned, head falling back onto his chest.

"I want you to beg for it," the demon cooed, "beg for a release. Beg for your death, Winchester, and I might give it to you."

Dean coughed, his body shuddering, and opened his mouth to speak. "Please…"

"No," Sam shouted, fighting against the demon's hold, fighting to save his brother, "don't do it!"

"He doesn't love you," the creature taunted, "if he loved you, it wouldn't be so cold."

"Please," Dean continued, "just make it stop."

"My pleasure," the demon grinned, dropping its eyes before looking back at the defeated hunter. The scene that began to play out before Sam's eyes was one that he'd hoped he would never see again. Invisible claws ripping his brother apart, killing him, maiming him, wrecking him. And Dean just stood there, stuck to the wall, not even caring. Not even fighting. Not even begging.

Sam called his brother's name, heard his brother scream, and then his body was on fire. Long tendrils of pain burned along his chest, ripping him open. He looked down, fully expecting to see injuries like his brother's, long lines of blood being drawn across his chest. There was nothing there.

The demon screamed in pain, clutching at its host's chest and backing away from the battered empath. Its hold on the brothers diminished and both men were sent crashing to the floor. It didn't care, though, just kept screaming, kept holding its stomach.

As he looked up from his spot on the floor, watching the demon writhe in pain, Sam could have sworn he saw a triumphant grin on his dying brother's face.

o0o0o0o0o

"Sam! Sammy! Wake up, man, come on!" Strong hands. Strong hands shaking him, careful to keep his head from banging against the hardwood table. That was the first thing Sam noticed as he swam up out of the haze that his vision had left.

"Dean? What are you doing up?"

He opened his eyes in time to see Dean slump into a chair next to him. "Woke up with a killer headache and came down to get some aspirin," the elder explained, "found you passed out at the table." He shook his head slowly, rubbing his temples, "man, anyone ever tell you those vision headaches are a bitch?"

Sam grinned as his brother passed him a bottle of water and a couple of pills. "Welcome to my life."

Dean just nodded. "So, what did you see?"


	10. Chapter 9

Wow. Over 100 reviews. This has got to be the best week ever, and it's not even done yet! I even had a dream about SN last night (of course, Dean was pregnant with his and Ellen's baby, but that's not important (oh, and you can bet I'm writing a fic about that one!)). What IS important is that you guys are still reading and reviewing and that I love you all SOOOOOO much for that. Now, on with the show...

* * *

"So, it killed me?" Dean asked, watching as Sam rubbed at his chest, fingers dancing delicately over the shirt he'd been wearing that day, making their way over the invisible wounds that had been felt rather than inflicted.

The younger man nodded, "not before you could kill it first, though."

"And how did I do that again?"

"I don't know exactly. You didn't really do anything. It just started screaming."

Dean leaned back in his chair, careful to keep his feet off the coffee table. The brothers had moved into the sitting room after Sam had snapped completely out of his daze for a little more comfort. "There's something you're not telling me."

Sam shook his head, carefully avoiding his brother's gaze. He wasn't exactly eager to tell Dean about his own pain, the way those cuts had burned across his body without really being there. He wasn't sure how his brother would take it, but had the feeling that the older man would blame himself.

"If it makes a difference," Dean said gently, "I know how you feel." Sam rolled his eyes. "No pun intended," the elder added as an afterthought.

Sammy grinned. "If I tell you, do you promise not to freak out?"

"As long as you don't, I should be ok."

"Well," the younger hunter began, dropping his eyes again, "the demon wasn't the only one that started screaming. I, uh, I did, too. I could feel… it was like I was being ripped apart, but there wasn't any blood. I think-"

"You think I did it?"

"I think it was an accident," Sam replied, choosing his words carefully, "and that you killed the demon. That's what's important."

Dean sighed, running a hand over his face. "Yeah, I guess."

"You all right?"

"Well," he grinned, "it's kinda hard to get mad at myself with your understanding ass in the room."

o0o0o0o0o

It wasn't often that Dean Winchester was scared, and it was ever rarer for him to show that fear, or let it be expressed in any way, which was why Missouri decided to sit down and have a little chat about it.

"Sam had a vision last night," the hunter stated before the older psychic even had a chance to open her mouth.

"I know."

"He saw me kill the demon without even touching it."

She nodded. "That's a good thing, Dean, so why are you so worked up?"

He hung his head. "I didn't just hurt the demon. I got Sammy, too." He brought his head up and locked eyes with the psychic. "I need to learn how to control this before that thing finds us again."

"Well, you're on your way. A lot further along than I ever would have pictured you by now."

"What are you talking about?"

"That honesty," Missouri sighed, "just now. It's not yours. You're channeling your brother, whether you realize it or not, because it's just easier for him to tell the whole story and ask for help."

"That's it?" Dean asked, "I told you something was bugging me and you automatically assume that it's because I'm psychic now. Man, you're as bad as Sam, maybe even worse if that's all the evidence you've got."

"What did I tell you the other day about interrupting me? I wasn't finished. You're _projecting_, too. I could feel that fear of yours all the way at the other end of the house."

"That's just because-"

"What? Because I'm psychic? Boy, I've had three paying customers leave this morning because of you. One of them was a regular. Been coming here for years. Figured I'd keep the rest of the afternoon open and get this thing of yours under control before anyone else runs into my driveway screaming."

Dean shrugged. "Sounds like a plan to me."

o0o0o0o

Somewhere in the house, a door slammed shut. Sam jumped out of his seat, barely stifling a scream. He'd been on edge all morning, his heart pumping, adrenalin rushing, mouth dry. It was almost like he was scared, but of what was a mystery.

He took a couple of deep breaths and put all of his focus back on the laptop screen. His vision had taken place in a motel room somewhere, he was sure of that. The place had been dumpy looking, small, and lit by dim, blinking bulbs. Not one of the best rooms he'd ever been in, but definitely not one of the worst.

Not that he'd been there. Actually, he was hoping to stay away. As much as he wanted revenge for everything that had happened to him and his family, he wasn't about to knowingly sacrifice that family to get it. He wasn't going to go marching after the demon again if he knew Dean's life was in danger. Hell, if he'd known what would happen the first time he never would have suggested going after the damned thing.

So he scoured the internet, looking for anything the resembled the motel room they'd been in when the demon attacked. He could remember a dark red color scheme, the color of blood, fittingly enough, and stationary with a deer head on it. He'd seen the state abbreviation. IA. Iowa.

Sam tried to narrow his search as much as he could, hardly noticing as the fear that had gripped him all morning slowly gave way to a proud sense of accomplishment.

o0o0o0o0o

Dean practically collapsed into the old wooden chair. He crossed his arms on the kitchen table and rested his head on them, panting slightly as cold sweat dripped from his nose onto the scratched tabletop. "You could have warned me," he muttered.

"Now where's the fun in that?" Missouri asked, grabbing a glass from a cabinet before heading to the fridge. "Thirsty?"

"Just tired."

The psychic nodded. "You're getting better at it, though." She poured herself some lemonade before heading out of the room. "You need anything," she called back to him, "you know what to do." The only reply Dean could muster was a tired moan.

He sat with his head down, exhausted. His whole body ached and felt weak, his mind couldn't stop wandering, and his heart was racing in his chest. But he had done it. He'd made the older psychic cry, had headed out to the park with her and been able to comfort a little girl with a scraped knee from halfway across the grassy expanse. He'd been able to make a couple stop fighting, had pinpointed the hurt that their own child, sitting in the grass and watching, had felt. Even better, he'd been able to turn that hurt into love, and had felt it coming off the kid when his folks had stopped their little shouting match.

It had taken a lot out of him, though. Physically and emotionally drained, Dean didn't even bother to raise his head when he heard soft footfalls on the nearby stairs. He knew it was Sam before the younger man even walked into the room, could feel the familiar mix of concern and sympathy.

"What happened to you?" Sammy asked, walking over to a cupboard and grabbing a mug.

"Practice," the elder muttered, still not bothering to look up.

"Practice?" Sam repeated, crossing to the refrigerator and taking a peek inside, looking for something to drink, "what were you practicing?"

Dean sighed, trying to gather the strength to reply. However, being the constant thinker that he was, he had another, better, more devious, not to mention fun- for him, at least- idea. Head still down, the empath closed his eyes and focused.

Sam pulled a can of Coke out of the fridge and popped it open, waiting for his brother's reply. When Dean didn't supply one, he figured the elder hunter had fallen asleep, or decided to, once again, close every door to him.

_Memo to self_, Sam thought as he began to empty the contents of the pop can into his glass, _never reference "Technicolor Dreamcoat" or Donnie Osmond while near Dean._

In all honesty, Sam could have started quoting "Pretty Woman" and Dean wouldn't have said a word. The empath was off in his own little world, lost in a flood of memories. Cassie, one-night stands, the kinds of movies he watched and websites he visited when he was sure Sammy wasn't around. He summoned the thoughts, reveling in the pure pleasure they provided, and mentally pushed.

"Not in a talking mood, huh?" Sam asked, "I really thought you'd be more open now, man. I mean, you haven't exactly been your usual, Fort Knoxx-y self lately, and-" He stopped, a small gasp escaping his lips and his eyes going wide as he stared into his glass.

Sam leaned his weight against the counter, trying not to collapse, wondering exactly what was going on. This kind of thing hadn't happen to him since he was fifteen. He'd thought it was over. It was supposed to be over, at least, that's what his Sex Ed teacher had said, but she was a chick, so what did she know?

He moaned quietly, a little embarrassed. If he was feeling this way, wouldn't Dean be picking up on it? Dean, who was suddenly so good at reading people and picking up on every little change in emotion. Dean, who had been freakishly open lately. Dean, who had… _been practicing_?

"You jerk!" Sam shouted, turning on his heels to face his brother, who had finally brought his head off the table and was smiling wide, "I can't believe you… you just…"

"Aw, that's so cute," Dean cooed, batting his eyelashes, "Sammy's getting all defensive. Embarrassed?"

"You did this to me?"

The elder rolled his eyes. "You really think that I could… _arouse_ you? No, Sammy-boy, I think the Coke's doing a pretty good job all by its lonesome. And here I always took you for a Pepsi man."

"Bitch," Sam growled, grabbing his pop and storming awkwardly out of the room, leaving Dean to laugh himself to sleep at the table.

o0o0o0o0o

_Old black and white "Twilight Zone" reruns flashed across the screen, filling the run-down house with creepy music as Dean sat on the couch, his eyelids heavy. He glanced at the clock for what seemed the hundredth time that night and began to worry. Sammy should have been home by now._

_It wasn't that Dean was afraid that his brother would get into trouble that he couldn't get himself out of, because he'd seen the younger boy fight. No, he was just worried that the ten-year-old wouldn't make it home by midnight._

_He'd told Sammy to hurry home, told him it was important. But Sam had been so excited, just bouncing off the walls, and Dean was starting to doubt that his brother had heard his plea._

_It was that stupid kid Jimmy, one of Sam's friends, that was keeping the younger Winchester out of the house. It was Jimmy's lavish half-birthday party that had drawn Sam in like a mosquito to a bug zapper, pulled him in with enough force to make him forget what a special day it was._

_This wasn't the first time, either. No, he'd skipped Christmas with the family to hand out with Jimmy, whose parents had a holiday cabin on the outskirts of town. Sam had begged, desperate to go, and Dean had given him the ok._

_He'd given the ok for this, too, so long as Sammy promised to be home before midnight. Dean was determined not to repeat Christmas, alone in the house, sitting in front of the TV, eating cold lunchmeat sandwiches. No, _this_ holiday would be a celebration._

_The front door slowly creaked open and soft footsteps sounded in the hall. "Took you long enough," Dean called, flipping off the TV to meet his brother, "how was the party?"_

_"It was awesome," Sammy gushed, his excitement flooding the hall and hitting Dean like a tong of sugar-high bricks, "his folks rented out the _entire_ bowling alley!"_

_"You know," Dean scoffed, wondering exactly how he was supposed to compete with something like that, "renting a bowling alley isn't normal."_

_"Neither is hunting demons," Sam shot back acidly, bitter resentment flowing off his small body._

_"What I mean," Dean defended, leaning against a wall as hid knees began to shake with the force of his brother's sudden anger, "is that it sounds like a fun party."_

_Sammy backed down. "It was. It was long, too. Should get to bed."_

_"You think you might be able to stay awake long enough to-?"_

_"No, Dean. It was a long day. I'm tired."_

_"But, it's-"_

_"I don't care," Sam sighed, walking past his brother and toward the bedrooms._

_"I got a cake, though," Dean attempted, ignoring his brother's growing annoyance and following the younger boy down the hall to his bedroom door, "it's not chocolate."_

_Sam stopped, his hand on the doorknob, ready to turn it and head into his room, closing and locking the door behind him to fall into a deep sleep where he would undoubtedly dream of being normal. "You like chocolate, though," he said simply._

_"You don't."_

_The ten-year-old scowled, annoyance building, hating the way that his brother submitted to his every whim. He wanted to work for something, wanted to earn it on his own. Mostly, though, he just wanted to sleep. Unfortunately, that was the only thing that Dean didn't pick up on, the exhaustion lingering just below the bitter anger and need to break free from the life of a hunter._

_"You're an idiot, Dean," Sam hissed, putting as much anger as he could behind the words before pulling the door open, stepping into his room, and slamming it shut hard enough to rattle the frame and shake a picture loose from the wall._

_Dean stood in the hallway, listening to the sound of his brother stomping around behind the closed door. He stood there and let the anger and honesty of Sam's last statement sink in, filling him with his own sense of regret and rejection. Slowly, he turned around and headed for the kitchen._

_The teenager pulled open the refrigerator door and searched the nearly-empty appliance. He found what he wanted and brought it out, opening the small box and setting it on the table._

_He grabbed a lighter from his pocket and pulled out the little cardboard box he'd swiped from a convenience store earlier that day. He carefully placed the candles and lit them, one by one._

_Dean sat down at the kitchen table and watched the small flames flicker. He could still feel Sam and that anger, but concentrated on blocking it out. He realized sadly that he was letting go of the last emotional tie he had, keeping Sammy out of his heart to avoid that anger and rejection. He pushed the thought away, though, and focused on what was in front of him._

_He closed his eyes, wondering briefly when his father would get back from his latest hunt. He blew out the candles, not even bothering to make a wish. Wishes weren't real. They never came true._

_In the little house, in the middle of the night, with his father bleeding badly in a forest nearly one hundred miles away and his brother tossing and turning in a fitful sleep upstairs, Dean ate his birthday cake. Alone._

o0o0o0o

Dean's eyes popped open in the still darkness of the kitchen as his breath hitched in his chest. Why even try? Wasn't history said to repeat itself? If Sam hadn't changed his mind then, why now? What was different, besides the obvious fact that Sammy could hop in the car and drive away, instead of just walking down the street to his friend's house?

The hunter closed his eyes, wondering if it was really worth it. The feeling of warmth and love that was starting to worm its way back into his system was nice, but it still wasn't good enough. It wasn't _Sam_. And Sam was all he really had left. If he didn't have Sam, then he didn't have anything.


	11. Chapter 10

Wow. You know, when I logged off last night I had 107 reviews that the site wouldn't let me read (grumbles). Today I get on and find so many more. Thank you all so much!

As for how long the planning of a story takes (becuase supernaturals asked), it really depends. I know that the only planning for my Angel's Wings series (which you all should read if you haven't yet :)) was basically "I want to write a story where Dean sprouts wings but doesn't end up with Sam in the end." Seriously. It just kind of went from there.

With this story, I had the main idea, with a few scenes that I really liked, and just started typing. I got the idea to put flashbacks in while I was walking through the halls in my school one day, and the birthday scene that ended the last chapter was actually supposed to be the epilogue for the Christmas story I'm currently working on (I know it's early, but I have a heavy class load next year!).

I guess what I;m trying to say is that there isn't much planning. No outline (and if I do make one, I usually stray away from it pretty quick). I just kind of let the story go where it goes (like the one I'm currently working on, an MPreg story that was supposed to be funny, but SO wasn't by the end of page one. I just know it's gonna be angsty!).

Hope that answers your question :)

* * *

Sammy quickly jotted down the notes, nodding as the voice on the other end of the telephone gave him directions to a small Wisconsin town. Joshua had called his cell early that morning, long before Sam had bothered to roll over and climb out of bed. Turned out that Josh had found a hunt, a very intriguing one by the sound of it.

"And you really think it's a hellmouth?" Sam asked, underlining the phrase in his notebook.

"Maybe not a hellmouth," the other hunter replied, "but something like it. There's been a lot of activity in the area recently. People going missing, others turning up dead, animal corpses littering roadsides. There's something going on up in Wisconsin, Sammy. Something bad."

Sam nodded. "I'll talk to Dean, see how soon we can head out."

"Thanks, man," Josh said.

"No problem. See you soon?"

"Yeah." The line clicked.

o0o0o0o0o

In a cozy home in Michigan, Joshua Bounty hung up his phone, a grin spreading over his face as his eyes turned an oily shade of black. "Sooner than you think."

o0o0o0o0o

"Treason, Wisconsin."

"Catchy name," Dean quipped, finally bringing his head off the table and cringing at the sore muscles in his neck and back, "any reason you're starting the day with it?"

"Joshua called," Sam stated down across from his brother and eyeing the older man with concern, "seems to be overrun by a swarm of nasties lately."

"Did you just say 'nasties?'" Dean asked, blinking in confusion, "because I could've sworn I just heard you say 'nasties.' Is that even a word?"

"It is if I say it is. Now focus, Dean, this is important. Josh says there's something going on in Treason. Something demonic. He thinks it may be an open hellmouth. He wants us to check it out for him."

"Going to a place called Treason because someone we haven't heard from in nearly a year told us they've got demons coming out the persqueeter a couple of days after you have a vision about us getting our asses kicked in some run-down motel because our little Yellow-eyed friend showed up uninvited just doesn't seem like a good idea right now, Sammy."

Sam cocked an eyebrow. "Did you even breathe in there?"

"I'm just saying," Dean muttered, leaning across the table, "that I value my life and yours. I'm not heading into this if that freak's lying in wait for us."

"And I'm saying that it's all right," the younger psychic countered, "because I saw some motel stationary in my vision. We were in Iowa when the demon attacked, not Wisconsin. We should be safe."

"But you're not sure."

"Nothing's ever sure, Dean."

"I don't want to walk into a trap."

"It's perfectly safe. I trust Josh. Besides, those people in that town are in trouble."

"You're overly-emoting."

"Pot calling the kettle black."

"We could wait it out," Dean reasoned, "I mean, these people have to learn to fend for themselves eventually. We're not always going to be there to protect them. Call Josh back and tell him to take the case. He can call if he needs back-up. Until then, we can hang out here a little longer. At least we know we're safe here."

Sammy leaned back in his seat. Safety. Comfort. Warmth. Love. It must have been so much better than some second-rate motel room in a small Wisconsin town. No wonder he wanted to stay. Too bad he couldn't. "We have to. I already promised."

"Fine," the elder finally conceded, "but if I get my ass pinned to a wall by some demon, I'm blaming you."

"Even if it does happen- which it won't- we'll survive."

"That's what you think," Dean grinned, "let's just say Coke won't be your only turn-on if you're wrong about this."

o0o0o0o0o

The car roared down the highway, leaving Kansas far behind as the brothers headed up to Treason. The interior of the car, however, was freakishly quiet. The radio had been turned down to the point that the usually blaring classic rock was barely louder than a whisper. There was no conversation, no brotherly banter, not even a sniffle. Just silence.

Sam glanced over at his brother, who stared out the windshield, his eyes never moving, hands never leaving the comforting leather of the wheel. Sammy cleared his throat.

Dean's eyes began to stray from the concrete that stretched endlessly before him just in time to see Sam's head whip toward the window. He turned back to the road.

Sammy let his eyes wander back to his brother, finally turning his head to get a better look. That had been a close call. Dean had almost seen him. He wasn't sure why that was a bad thing, just knew that it was.

The older man snapped his head around suddenly, catching Sam in the act of peeking. "Alright, what is it?"

"What do you mean?" Sam shrugged innocently, eyes wandering back toward his window.

"This peeking thing. What, are you five, or something?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh, cut the crap, Sam. I know you know. What's wrong?"

The younger man leaned up against the door, letting his head rest against the cool window. "You seemed kind of reluctant to leave today."

"Of course I didn't want to leave. I'm not gonna walk into a trap. Contrary to popular belief, I _am_ smarter than that."

"I know," Sam muttered weakly.

"See," Dean shrugged, "that wasn't so hard to admit."

"No. I mean I know why you wanted to stay so bad."

"You should. I just told you, like, five seconds ago."

"You didn't tell me. Well, you kind of did."

"Did you hit your head?"

"She told me. Missouri. She told me why you wanted to stay."

Dean closed his eyes, sighing softly. "Oh."

"I just want you to know that, even though it might not feel like it now-"

"Sam, don't."

"No, Dean, you need to hear this. You need to know. No matter what you think, I-"

"Don't even start, Sammy, or, so help me, I'll pull this car over, beat you within an inch of your life, tie you to the roof , and drive under a _very_ low bridge. Understood?"

Sam gulped. "Yeah. Got it."

"Good. Now shut up. I can't hear my music." Leaning forward, the older man cranked up the volume, filling the car instantly with a too-loud guitar solo.

Sammy settled back in his seat, still gazing at his brother out of the corner of his eye. He couldn't help but worry. This was something new, an invasion of privacy, and it didn't seem to be going over too well in big brother's mind.

He sighed, closing his eyes and hoping to get in some sleep before arriving in Treason. All at once, a sense of understanding flooded over him. His eyes snapped open and he looked at Dean, who sat, hands on the wheel, staring out at the road, a content smile playing across his face.

"You gotta worry less, man," he grinned, "you'll give yourself an ulcer."

"You-?"

"I get it. Go to sleep. It's gonna be a long drive."

o0o0o0o0o

"Definitely not my choice of décor," Dean muttered as he walked through the door of the motel room he'd rented just outside of Treason. A single blinking lamp that sat on the bedside table provided the room's only light beside the few strangled beams that fought their way through the grime-streaked window. The room was dark red, almost black, and covered in a very tacky splatter patterned wallpaper. _Nice._

Shaking his head at the bloody color scheme, the hunter tossed his luggage onto the first bed he saw and promptly began digging through it.

He glanced out the window to see Sam, still sitting in the car, finally starting to wake up. Dean turned back to his duffle bag, sifting through dirty clothes, a few odd weapons, and moldy containers of food to find a piece of paper.

The psychic shuddered in the suddenly chilly room as he scraped the bottom of the bag for a pen. He left the contents of his luggage spread out on the bed as he grabbed his pen and paper and headed to the room's gloomy desk.

More spatters of something dark covered the scratched desktop, but Dean hardly noticed as he sat down and began to write.

Something didn't feel right about Treason. Something didn't feel right about the hunt. Hell, nothing even felt right about the room. And if there was one thing Dean was learning to do, it was trust his feelings.

They hadn't heard from Josh since the reaper thing in Nebraska, so why would he suddenly call with a new hunt? What was up with the town name? And the dark, bloody quality of the room? Honestly, if Dean had paid any attention in high school English, he would have called it foreshadowing and put the town and motel in the Impala's rearview before dark. And the room itself? Well, it was just too cold, too empty. For a place that had been visited by so many people, it should have at least had _some_ kind of resonating emotion in it, right?

No, something didn't sit right with the empath. It felt like a setup.

Slowly, Dean began listing the things that didn't quite make sense. It might have seemed like a pointless thing to do, but his father had always told him that sorting out thoughts could really help in the long run. Besides, maybe showing Sammy something concrete would change his opinion, even if Sam hadn't always agreed with dad's list theory.

Dean shuddered again, pulling his jacket more tightly around himself as the temperature in the room dropped at least another fifteen degrees. He set down the pen and went looking for some form of climate control, betting that, given the quality of the room he was staying in, the closest thing he would find would be a broken hair dryer.

It was at that exact moment that Sam chose to make his grand entrance, stumbling groggily from the car to the open door of the room. He glanced around his latest home, his eyes going wide as his heart stopped and his breath hitched in his chest.

Startled green eyes scanned the room, searching desperately for reassurance, for safety, for something that wasn't so terribly familiar. What they landed upon was a piece of crumpled stationary from a western Iowa motel with a list hastily scrawled on it. A chill ran down the hunter's spine even though it was far from cool in the room.

Gulping down fear, Sammy called his brother's name. he gasped as Dean came into view, emerging from the small closet, shaking violently, teeth chattering. "This is it," Sam whispered, pointing to his brother's list, "we need to leave."

"Won't be that easy, Sammy," Dean replied, blowing warm breath into his cupped hands and rubbing them vigorously together, "it's already here."

The door slammed shut.


	12. Chapter 11

What... have you all been looking for this?

* * *

Groaning, Sam forced his eyes open. It took a moment for everything to sink in, for him to remember where he was and why he was pinned to the wall. He looked around the room, at the flickering lamp, the blood-splattered wall, the pale young man pinned up across the room.

Wait…

"Dean?"

The limp figure at the other end of the motel room stirred, raising its head and proving that it was, indeed, Sam's brother. He was soaked with sweat, his skin was pale, there were terribly dark circles under his eyes, and his lips were a soft shade of blue, but it was Dean.

"You ok?" the older man asked, his voice weak.

"Should be asking you that. What's up?"

Dean shrugged, starting to shake. "Demon. It's so cold."

Sam blinked, tearing his eyes away from his shivering brother to scan the room for the evil, unseen presence. There weren't any dark masses hiding out in shadowy corners, no yellow eyes sparking to life in the shadows, nothing but Dean's violent shaking and the unseen force that was pinning the brothers to the walls to indicate that anything was wrong. "Where is it?"

Dean smirked. "Bathroom."

"The bathroom?"

"Host body had to take a leak, I guess."

"So it busted into our room, threw us up against the walls, stuck us there, and then left us hanging so it could use our facilities? Man, that's weird, even for us."

"You're telling me." Behind the closed bathroom door, a toilet flushed. "Get your game face on."

The door to the bathroom burst suddenly open in a spray of flying splinters revealing a strapping man in his early thirties with jet black hair and glowing yellow eyes. "Damn humans," it hissed, "weak bladders. One of these days…" The eyes shot up, wandering over its two victims as a smile broke out on the demon's stolen face. "Well, well, well. Nice of you to finally join us, Sammy."

"It's Sam," the hunter hissed, staring evil in the eye and not even flinching.

"Whatever you say," the demon cooed, striding confidently into the room, "it doesn't really matter, anyhow. You're back in the land of the waking, and that's all I care about. It certainly took you long enough."

Sam felt his heart skip a beat. How long had he been out? How long had he left Dean alone with the thing that had killed their parents? How much time had the demon had to worm inside the elder hunter's mind and twist his thoughts? Exactly how cold was it?

"What do you want?" Sam asked, staring past the demon as it neared the center of the room, looking over the creature's shoulder and trying to assess his shaking sibling.

"You, of course," the demon answered, changing direction and heading toward the young psychic, "it's always been you, Sam. You're the special one. You're the one that I want."

"Quoting 'Grease?'" Dean quipped, laughing shallowly, "never took you for a fan of musicals. Or John Travolta. You know he's playing a chick in his next movie?"

"Funny," the demon barked, spinning around to face the older man, "but that's all part of your MO, isn't it?"

"Déjà vu," Dean commented.

A large smile lit up the possessed man's face as he stepped toward the empath. "You know, I think you're right. Only, this time, daddy isn't here to save you. You know why that is, don't you, Dean?"

The hunter flinched, dropping his gaze from the shining yellow eyes as the demon turned its attention back on its intended target. "Now," it hissed, slowly approaching Sam, "what do you say we finish our little conversation, hmm?"

Yellow eyes glinted in the dim light of the room as Sam watched the demon grow closer, its mouth twisting into an even bigger smile. It was halfway across the room, halfway to Sam, when it stopped.

The demon spun around, stalking up to Dean, its smile faltering. It focused on his pale skin, ran a finger down his chest, laughed as the older hunter's breath hitched in his throat. "It's so cold, isn't it?" the demon asked, moving in closer, "and there's no escape. Nothing but death."

Still gasping, Dean raised his eyes to look at it. He moaned, head falling back onto his chest.

"I want you to beg for it," the demon cooed, "beg for a release. Beg for your death, Winchester, and I might give it to you."

Dean coughed, his body shuddering, and opened his mouth to speak. He once again raised his head, looking over at Sam, eyes sparkling with understanding and comprehension and a certain preparedness which all Winchesters are born possessing.

"Please," he muttered weakly, head falling, eyelids fluttering, "please, take… take it… take it all back, you… you _son of a bitch_." His head snapped up, lips no longer blue, skin regaining a bit of its usual tan, and the demon fell back onto the floor, flailing and clutching at it's chest.

"You…" it hissed, glaring daggers up at the older man, who had focused all of his attention on the beast, "you…"

"Sammy isn't the only psychic in the family," the empath muttered through gritted teeth, "hurts, doesn't it?"

Sam watched the scene unfold in front of his eyes, watched the demon clutch at its stolen chest, right where the heart was, watched as tears leaked from the pitiless yellow eyes, watched at the body on the floor was wracked with sobs. He couldn't believe it.

"Stop it," the creature hissed, wiping warm saltwater away from its eyes, "stop it now, or I'll-"

"Or you'll what?" Dean demanded, his strength slowly returning, "you'll take my family? You'll take my life? You already have. There's nothing left for you."

"Foolish empath. You're not dead yet. You only _feel_ dead." It got up on one knee only to be knocked down again as Sam felt a wave of raw emotion hit him. Depression, pain, loss, abandonment, all rushing at him. Betrayal, hurt, despair, rejection, bitterness, regret. He muttered his brother's name, the weight of the world on his shoulders suddenly becoming too much, pressing on his chest, causing him to cry out. He didn't want to be alone anymore, or cold, or empty, or lost, or unloved. And it stopped.

Sam gasped, shaking his head and blinking tears from his eyes as the emotional overload was swept away. He could see Dean on the other side of the room, still pinned and looking at him with fear on his face.

"I'm sorry," the older man whispered, glancing at the floor, "you shouldn't have… but it's dead now. It's dead. Look."

Sam followed his brother's gaze. Sure enough, the demon was lying on the ground, hand still clutching its heart, unmoving. It looked dead, but something didn't quite add up. "Dean," Sam said, surprised by the shaky quality of his voice, "if it's dead, then why are we still stuck?"

"Shit."

Yellow eyes sparked suddenly to life as the demon slid up from its position on the floor, a sly smile plastered across its stolen face. "Tsk, tsk. You boys should know by now that demons don't feel. There's no way you can possibly kill me. I _can_ kill you, however."

Dean began to scream.

* * *

I know, short update, nothing eventful happening... that shouldn't stop you from reviewing, though :) 


	13. Chapter 12

I'm so glad that everyone's still loving this story (I'm REALLY loving all the reviews). Once again, I'd like to thank everyone who's taken the time to type up a review, I know how hard it can be.

Now for the bad news: only three more chapters left after this one :(

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Pain seared across Sam's chest and stomach. Burning, ripping, shredding, cutting, _killing_ pain. He could see his own reaction mirrored on his brother's face. Or, was it the other way around? Because, while Dean was bleeding profusely as those merciless invisible claws tore away at him, Sam had yet to lose a drop of blood. Dean was projecting, and Sammy was picking up on it.

Even as the brothers' screams blended together, the demon fell back to the floor, this time clutching at its stomach. Inhuman shrieks joined the Winchesters' chorus as the demon felt the full force of its own attack turned against it. It writhed on the floor, yet somehow found the focus to continue its attack.

Sam could feel the new sting of his brother's fresh cuts, could feel how deep they went, how close they were coming to damaging internal organs.

And then it was back, that loss and regret and rejection and abandonment and despair. It washed over him all at once, strong enough to overpower the intense pain for just a moment, a second in time when he finally understood. Everything his brother did, he did so he wouldn't feel like this all the time, hurting without wounds, bleeding without blood, screaming without being heard. It was enough to drive a man mad.

A man, or, apparently, a demon.

The pain in his middle tapered off, leaving only that overwhelming sense of loss. Sam looked down at the demon, at the host body trembling on the blood red carpet, at the blood pouring from the possessed man's eyes and nose and ears as he clawed at his heart, breaking the skin and sending fresh blood seeping through his shirt and onto the floor.

The host was fighting, not the demon, but Dean. And he didn't stand a chance, even as the demon struggled to regain control, the man continued to claw, to scrape, to rip and tear and shed at his own skin. He moved from his aching heart to his face, pulling at the skin. Flesh ripped from bone and new screams echoed through the room, both the demon's and Dean's.

Suddenly, Sam's face was on fire, too. The pain increased as the possessed man continued to rip at his skin, clawing at his eyes, trying to escape his life, which had recently become a prison full of sorrow and pain. No wonder he wanted to leave. No wonder he was willing to die to escape it all.

More than anything, though, the man wanted to hold on. One of those rare individuals willing to sacrifice himself for the greater good, he wasn't going down unless he could take the demon with him. Yellow eyes sparked to life, only to be replaced by bloody holes as its host fought to hold on to it.

The body fell limp and both brothers suddenly tumbled from their walls. Sam felt a fresh wave of pain hit him as Dean's body connected with the floor. There was no black smoke from the dead man, no demon flying from the room only to return later making deadly deals. It was gone. Actually gone. Forever.

_Dean_, his mind hissed as he clambered to his knees and a single tear slipped from his eye and stained his jeans. Slowly, he climbed over the gored remains of the demon's final host and to his brother's side. The feelings of loss and sadness and pain increased as he approached his brother, so much so that he had to stop a couple of times in his journey across the room. It shouldn't have been so hard, shouldn't have been so strong. He knew he was loved, so why didn't he feel it, dammit.

"Dean," he said softly, sniffling and running an arm over his eyes to clear his vision, "Dean, come on."

180 degrees. It was a complete flip, so sudden that he actually fell back on his ass. The sense of warmth and belonging and comfort and safety that flooded over him, totally canceling out anything he'd been feeling before, was overwhelming.

And he understood.

Why spend the rest of your life in pain and misery if you could feel like this instead? Why would you ever leave a house where you were surrounded by this ecstasy? Why on earth wouldn't you wonder why your only remaining family didn't give off these vibes whenever you were around?

And he felt guilty. So, so guilty.

o0o0o0o0o

_"I want us to be together again," Dean began, taking a cautious step toward his brother, "I want us to be a family again." He felt the bottom drop out of his stomach, felt his gut twist nervously around, his heart pounding, palms sweaty. He needed Sam to understand, needed the younger man to say something, anything, that would make all the fear and abandonment go away. He needed an answer, not this blank stare._

_"Dean, we are a family. I'd do anything for you." He felt himself relax, felt the tension easing away. It was almost exactly what he wanted to hear. The only thing missing was the 'I was only joking about going back to school and leaving you all alone again.' He waited with bated breath. "But things will never be the way they were before."_

_Another small step forward, his own equivalent of the puppy-dog stare. "We could be." He hated the way his voice sounded, so small and weak and pathetic. He was supposed to be the strong one, but this was just too much. First his mother's death, then his father's quest, his brother's stubborn trip to Stanford, dad's disappearance, and Sam's repeated threats to walk off into the setting sun. He couldn't take much more, not if he wanted to keep what was left of his sanity._

_Sammy just stared back at him, disgust written across his face. "I don't want us to be."_

_And that was it. Dean's world fell apart. Everything he'd wanted, everything he'd wished for, and it was gone. Just like that. Lost in some crummy apartment in a dreary Chicago neighborhood. His brother didn't want to be a family anymore, wanted normal and safe and loved. Dean didn't really care about normal, but the last two sounded nice._

_He hung his head, avoiding eye contact, wishing for the thousandth time in his life that he was a mind-reader, that he could know what was going on inside Sam's freaky, messed-up head._

_And he wanted him to stay, wanted to _make_ him stay. Make him _want_ to stay. Because if Sammy wanted something, he was bound to get it, come hell or high water._

_No, it wasn't the first time in his life that Dean wished he could make his brother feel something, and it certainly wouldn't be the last._


	14. Chapter 13

Wow. Only a couple more chapters left. Please, feel free to enjoy this :)

* * *

Sam hated hospitals. They seemed so cold and unforgiving, with their mercilessly bright lights and unbearable sterility. It wasn't the kind of place a person would think to find Dean Winchester, monster hunter extraordinaire, yet here he was, lying still as death, his bloody clothes bunched up on a chair beside him.

Not Sam's favorite place to be, but a place where Dean seemed to be spending more and more time lately.

He watched his brother sleep, only gaining comfort from the fact that this time he was breathing on his own, moving, twitching, even smiling a little. Hazel eyes moved under closed eyelids, as if he were having a dream, a vivid one that was helping him form the plan that would finally get him everything he'd ever wanted.

Sam didn't like to dwell on dreams, though. He found them annoyingly painful and heart-wrenching. He was just fine watching Dean sleep, listening to the beeping of the heart monitors and the small snores that passed through his brother's barely-parted lips. That was all he needed to feel good, to feel safe. To know that his brother and protector was alive and well, just taking a little nap in the shiny Wisconsin hospital.

All he needed was Dean. That was enough. The little bit of his family that was left. They were all they had, and they needed to stick together, no matter what. That was all he wanted. That feeling of safety and love that had rushed at him back in the motel room. He wanted his brother. He wanted his family.

The steady beeping stopped. It was replaced by a long, loud tone that signaled death, the last sound Sam had heard in his father's hospital room before Dean had collapsed, whether from exertion or something else, he wasn't sure. He'd never asked.

That didn't matter now, though, because this wasn't dad. This wasn't the man Sam had fought endlessly with, the man he'd told to go to Hell, the man he'd resented and loved for all of his life.

This was all he had left. This was Dean.

Hurried footsteps, people rushing down the hall. He could hear them, but he didn't want to leave. Never wanted to leave. Not again. He couldn't. At one time, long ago, it may have seemed tempting, getting out into the world and living his own life, making his own decisions, but not anymore. Now the only thing he really needed was lying in a hospital bed, not breathing, as that long, ominous tone sounded.

More footsteps, people in the room, pushing, pulling, out the door. Sammy stood in the hallway, looking at the door that stood between him and his brother. A doctor with a kind face and soft eyes grabbed his arm, leading him away from the commotion. They were going to do all they could. They were going to save Dean. The nice doctor said so. Sam didn't believe him, though. Nothing could make this all right.

He sat down in one of the hard plastic chairs in the waiting room, the kind that make your butt hurt after a few minutes so you stand up to pace the floor, grimacing at the embarrassing pins and needles shooting up your spine. He ran his hands through his hair, just thinking.

It hadn't been too long since he'd told Dean his master plan. Kill the demon and hightail it back to Cali. Back to normal, safe, loved. The only thing he'd overlooked was that he wasn't normal, wasn't safe, wasn't even loved. All of those feelings had burned on a ceiling in November 2005. The only place he could get them was his brother, his ever-vigilant protector.

Although, come to think of it, it might be nice to get away for a while, to just sit back and relax and take a few classes. Maybe not pre-law, but something challenging. No more hunting, that was for sure.

Maybe he could even get Dean to go with him. They'd rent an apartment, get real jobs…

Sam shook his head. Dean wasn't the type to settle. He'd never go for that. No, it was best to just go it alone, head back to Stanford and see if that scholarship was still waiting for him.

That sounded good. Head back to school, get back into the swing of things, forget about hunting and fires and demons and Dean. That was the original plan, after all, the one he'd set up in his head as the Impala had pulled away from Palo Alto that cool winter morning so long ago. He wasn't exactly sure what he'd been thinking, imagining spending the rest of his life with his overprotective brother. He'd never wanted to do that. That was the kind of thing Dean wanted.

An exasperated sigh escaped the young hunter's lips as he realized what was going on. "Dean," he whispered, hardly liking the angry tone in his voice. His brother was dying, no need to be angry. He should be scared, sad, nervous. Not angry. But he couldn't help it. Dean had manipulated him.

Sam hadn't been aware of it, and that was probably the scariest part. On the ride to the hospital, with his unconscious brother slumped over in the backseat, his mind had been on Stanford, on the fact that the demon was finally dead. He'd been thinking of freedom, of normalcy, of getting to be just another human being. He'd never considered Dean.

Obviously, everything that had been going on inside his body and soul back in that room wasn't really him. It was Dean, still projecting his emotions, even in the deep sleep that had plagued him since the demon's attack. The only questions remaining were whether or not he knew he could do it, and, if he did, would he purposely start manipulating people?

"He wouldn't do that," Sammy muttered, shaking his head, "he's not like that. Is he?"

"You know," a familiar voice called out, "talking to yourself is never a good thing."

Sam spun around to find Missouri Mosley standing in the doorway, looking frazzled yet respectable. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to see your brother."

"Might be a while," the hunter said softly, "he's, uh…"

The older psychic nodded. "I know. That's why I'm here."

"You wouldn't happen to know if he's gonna make it, would you?"

"I think he'll be fine, Sam. Now, what about you?" She crossed the room and pulled a chair close to the younger psychic, seating herself across from him and watching him carefully.

"I'm not sure," Sam mumbled, shaking his head and watching his bangs flap around, "I thought I was fine. Felt like I had my entire future planned out, and then Dean flatlined. He did something to me. Right before he died, he was… he made me want to stay with him."

"Is that really such a bad thing?"

"No, but he can't go around manipulating people. He needs to learn-"

"He's unconscious, Sam."

"You're saying it was unintentional?" Sammy asked.

"New things take a while to get used to," she stated softly, "this thing's grown so much since he was a child. Give it time."

"I don't have time to hang out with him when I could be getting back to my life."

The older psychic shook her head. "All of this and you still don't get it, do you?"

"I get it," he defended, "I do. He has abandonment issues. I shouldn't leave until he's emotionally stable. He's helped me so much in my life that I should help him. I just want to be like everyone else."

"When are you just gonna accept the fact that you can't?"

"I can't do that. I'm not giving up. I can have my own life, I just have to work for it."

"You can have a life right here, no effort required."

"I'm not going to do this for the rest of my life," Sammy insisted angrily.

"I'm not asking you to. Just try to think of someone other than yourself for once."

"You're starting to sound like Dean."

Missouri sighed, sitting back in the hard chair and placing her hands in her lap, a sure sign that the serious debate over the rest of Sam's life was over. "Speaking of our favorite little empath," she said, "what exactly happened to him?'

Sammy shrugged. "My vision came true. Almost. The demon came after us, but Dean got it down. He got the host to claw his own eyes out. The demon didn't escape. It's dead."

"And so is Dean."

"He was fine on the way here," the young man explained, "he was unconscious, sure, but not dead. Nowhere near dead. I don't know what happened. He was all right. The doctors said he'd be fine."

"Do you want to know what happened?"

"You know?"

She nodded. "You remember that day your brother had been practicing?" Sam nodded. "Remember how tired he was? That kind of thing takes a lot out of you. Facing that demon was bad. Forcing that wanting on you was worse, whether he realized he was doing it or not. He overtaxed himself."

"But he'll be all right?"

"You suddenly care?" she asked, leaning forward and locking eyes with him.

"You're not going to guilt me into staying with him. I can make my own decisions."

"I know that. Your brother does, too. That's the problem." Missouri stood up and grabbed her purse, heading towards the door.

"You're not staying?"

"I have something back home to take care of. It's taking everything I've got to get some of my customers back. That brother of yours really has them spooked. Tell Dean I dropped by."

Sam nodded, collapsing back into his chair as the door to the waiting room swung shut, leaving him all alone in the sterile atmosphere he hated so much.

"_You're a selfish bastard, you know that? You don't think of anyone but yourself." _More than one occasion. Dean had shouted that at him on more than one occasion, but always let him come back, no questions asked.

Forgiveness. Redemption. Family. That long, loud tone echoing through his heart, signaling the end of his hunter's life and the beginning of his normal one. No one left to pull him back into the unknown, no one left to sit up with him when the nightmares got too bad, no one left to chase the demons away. No demons left to chase. No more instantaneous forgiveness. He was on his own.


	15. Chapter 14

OMG! I'm so sorry it's taken so long to update (You all must be pretty mad, huh?), but I had a surprisingly busy Mother's Day weekend, and then my internet decided to stop working (It's actually taken about half an hour just to get to this site and post this, what with the on-again-off-again service).

Anyway, here's a new update, and just to clarify:

While driving towards the hospital, Dean was totally out of it. he started flashing back and projecting while in the hospital, and Sam figured it out. Now Sam's kinda ticked.

Hope that helps!_

* * *

_

_Bright hospital fluorescents buzzed over his head as he sat in the room, asking Sam about the aftermath of the crash. His head felt heavy. Mind hazy, something nagging him, tickling at the back of his mind. Something important. Something he should remember, but his mind just drew a big blank._

_Someone in the doorway cleared his throat. His father, peeking into the room, looking scared and tired and defeated. Not like a father should look, not after everything that had happened. He should have looked happy, overjoyed to see his eldest son pulling through after being in a possibly deadly coma since the wreck._

_Coffee. His father wanted coffee. That was good. It looked like his dad could use a little pick-me-up. Sam would get it. Good thing, too, because it looked like he was about to try and bite his father's head off._

_John lingered in the doorway for a moment, watching Sam wander off down the hall, before finally turning back to Dean. He stood there for a moment, staring at his son, watching his eldest boy squirm uncomfortably under his gaze._

"_What is it?" Dean asked. He'd never been too comfortable with uncomfortable silences, and this one was especially creepy._

_The older man sighed. "You know when…when you were a kid," he said, glancing at the walls, the floor, anywhere but Dean, " I'd come home from a hunt and after what I'd seen, I'd be wrecked. And you…you'd come over to me and you'd put your hand on my shoulder and you'd look me in the eye and you'd," he paused, finally bringing his gaze up, eyes wet with tears and filled with a sadness that shouldn't have been there, didn't belong there, "and you'd say 'It's okay Dad.'"_

_Dean stared at him, eyes wide, stomach clinching into nervous knots. This wasn't right, couldn't be. It wasn't… it wasn't his dad. His dad didn't say things like that._

_"I'm sorry, Dean."_

_"F-for what?"_

_"You shouldn't have had to say that to me. I should have been saying that to you. You know I put…I put too much on your shoulders, I made you grow up too fast. You took care of Sammy, you took care of me. You did that, and you didn't complain, not once. I just want you to know that I am so proud of you."_

_A cold hand wrapped around the young hunter's heart at the familiarity of the last words. _"I am so proud of you."_ Memories flashed through his head, hurting him, making him want to cry out. That pride, that feeling of accomplishment, the realization that it wasn't his dad, not anymore, because dad hated him, had hated him since he was nine and there was nothing he could do to change that._

_He closed his eyes for a moment, just long enough to glimpse bright yellow orbs smiling at him ,telling him he wasn't good enough, that no one wanted him, that no one needed him. Sam was his father's favorite. Even when they fought it was more concern that John had ever shown Dean._

_"Is this really you talking?" he asked, leaning away from the teary-eyed figured that blocked his only means of escape from the room._

_A reassuring smile, no sign that he knew what Dean was talking about, that his son thought he was possessed. "Yeah, yeah it's really me."_

_Dean still wasn't sure. He'd learned something in that cabin, when the demon had attacked. His father was only proud of him when he wasn't his father. He only said nice things when he wasn't really him. "Why are you saying this stuff?"_

_John stepped forward, sniffling a bit, and laid a heavy, calloused hand on his son's shoulder. "I want you to watch out for Sammy, ok?"_

_"Yeah, dad. You know I will. You're scaring me."_

_Full-on tears, streaking clean lines across his father's dirty, weathered face. "Don't be scared, Dean." There was no sincerity behind the words, no tone of comfort. John Winchester knew that, in order to survive, a person needed to be scared._

_Dean just stared at him. There was no comfort derived from the words, which had seemed so hollow and meaningless. Of course he should be scared. He knew what was out there. It had taken his mother. It had possessed his father. It had plans for his brother. It had tried to kill him._

_John leaned over, hand still resting on his son's shoulder. Dean could feel his father's breath on the side of his face, puffing down his neck. He hadn't been so close to the man in years. It was the kind of contact he'd yearned for as a child, a reassuring embrace, the proximity, the familiar sound of his father's heartbeat, the smell of cheap whiskey and cologne._

_And then John began to whisper. "You have to save your brother, Dean. That's the most important thing. Save him. If you can't do that, son, you'll have to," a slight sob, "you'll have to kill him. Dean, promise me that you'll kill him if you can't save him."_

_Dean jumped back, the words, cold like ice, stabbing him, twisting in, digging in, making his world go numb as his father, his drill sergeant, ordered him to do the impossible._

_"Promise me, Dean."_

_Not a request. An order. "I…promise." A choked reply, strangled, sounding far-off in the room. Not really him. Couldn't be._

_And then the smell of cheap whiskey was gone, the warm breath on his neck, the proximity, the heartbeat, whatever declaration of love he'd been hoping to hear fading with the last words John Winchester would ever speak to his eldest son. _

_A smile, a nod, and John disappeared through the door._

o0o0o0o0o

The waiting room door opened slowly to reveal the same kind-faced doctor that had led Sam down the hall earlier that day. He looked tired, haggard, spent. Sam didn't really care.

"How is he?" the hunter asked, hopping to his feet and searching the doctor's face for any signs of bad news.

"Better," the man replied, "much better than could be expected. He's fine. Breathing on his own again. That was quite a close call, though."

Sammy nodded. "Yeah. Any chance I'll be able to see him soon?"

The doctor sighed. "I suppose. Just don't stay long. He was asleep when I left. There may still be a nurse or two in there if you head back now."

"Thanks," Sam said, flashing a nervous smile and heading off down the hall toward his brother's room. Suddenly, he stopped and spun around. "Doctor? Um, did anything happen when you… when you brought him back? Any strange… things?"

The doctor shook his head. "Not that I can recall, although his pulling through was a miracle in itself."

"Thanks." He took off, back down the hallway, not quite running, but not quite walking. He passed by two nurses with tears in their eyes, their faces white with shock. They were whispering in hushed tones about the handsome young man they'd just helped resurrect, about how they got a bad feeling in that room.

Sam quickened his pace.

o0o0o0o0o

The bright hospital fluorescents buzzed softly overhead as Dean gazed weakly up at them, his eyelids heavy. He was alive. Alive, and cold, and alone.

There had been doctors and nurses in the room before, and then he'd lapsed into another flashback, a painfully vivid and recent one. When he'd come to he'd found the nurses gone, could hear them hurrying down the hall. He'd seen the spots of water on the otherwise pristine hospital sheets, had heard the tapering sobs, and he'd known.

He'd pulled it back after that. Hadn't even realized he'd been sending those long-ago emotions out at people, but he'd pulled them back.

The light buzzed, the clock ticked, and he was alone. He knew he'd come close to dying. Somewhere through the thick haze he'd felt the panic, the fear, had smelled the stench of death and rot and eternal sleep so sweet that thoughts of a life full of rejection could never penetrate. He'd wanted it. It would have been a welcome release.

Suicide was always an option, but not the Winchester way. Dean was supposed to go down in a blaze of glory. Sam was supposed to lay his graying head on a pillow one night, so many years from now, and never wake up. John and Mary Winchester were supposed to live long, full lives, but evil had other plans. Dean had other plans, too.

He let his eyelids slide shut, letting brief darkness take him. Sam had told him once that when the demon died he would go back to Stanford. Dean knew that he meant it. After all, when Sammy wanted something, he usually got it. Dean was usually the one to give it to him.

So, Sam was taken care of. He wanted a normal life, and he deserved it. No room for weapons or demons or Dean. No, the older hunter would have to go it alone from now on. No one to depend on, no one to love. He'd have to find his own way, surround himself with happy people, try to fill in those painful holes that life had left him with.

He could go back to the Roadhouse. Back to Jo. Sure, he knew that it wasn't really love, just a schoolgirl crush. Lust. It didn't matter, though. She would stand by him, would spend time with him. Maybe she could make him whole again.

Of course, there was always Ellen. She undoubtedly knew what Dean had done to her perfect daughter, and she probably wasn't too happy about it. The Roadhouse would be off-limits, as would Jo. Besides, the empath wasn't exactly eager to surround himself with more hatred. He'd had enough of that in his life.

Cassie. His mind naturally went to her next. She was the one he thought about when the nights got long, when he and Sam fought, when nothing seemed right. He could have had something. Maybe he still could.

There was always the possibility, though, that he would arrive on her doorstep to find that she had gotten married in his long absence, or that she had moved on in some other way. She could always slam that door, always laugh at him, always turn him away.

And what if she didn't really love him? What if he got there and she let him in, but it was all bitter disappointment and regret? Would he really be able to live the rest of his life like that, surrounded by thoughts of what could have been and would never be?

He wasn't ready to go back to Cassie, wasn't prepared to drive back to Missouri just to be rejected. Unless, of course, the Missouri he traveled to wasn't the state.

He could always go back to the psychic, tell her some story about wanting to know more about what was happening to him. She would know the truth, of course, but lying was easier, at least when Sam wasn't around. She would let him stay with her, encompassed in that warmth and safety. He could help out around the house, do little odd jobs, earn his keep. Maybe he could be happy.

A small smile played at Dean's lips. For once in his life, happily ever after seemed within reach.


	16. Chapter 15

This is it, huh? The end. The final chapter. Fin.

I'd like to take the time to, yet again, thank everyone for reading and reviewing (I'm so close to getting 200 reviews for this story that I can almost taste it... and it's soooo sweet!). I really hope that I'm able to finish this story up well, I hope that everything makes sense, and I hope that season 3 of SN doesn't totally steal this idea and not pay me for it :)

BTW, did you guys hear that Jensen got jumped on by a fan at Asylum this weekend LOL

And now... the final chapter...

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His shoes clicked noisily down the hall as Sammy finally slowed his pace. He could see the door to Dean's room. Taking a deep breath to steady his nerves, he slipped around the corner and stood in the doorway, staring into the room at his brother.

Dean was asleep, his eyes closed, a sad little smile on his face. He looked peaceful. He also looked pale. The blood loss in the room had been bad, had, in fact, required a transfusion, and the older hunter had yet to regain his color.

Sam leaned up against the doorframe, watching his sleeping brother, the small intake of breath, the whistle of air that came with every exhale. He looked at the smile on the older man's face, so slight and sad. Suddenly, nothing seemed fair.

Why should he be able to go off to school and live a normal life while Dean searched for something he'd probably never find? Why couldn't they both have a home? Why was he suddenly thinking about this?

Sighing angrily, Sam turned on his heel and walked away from the room, expecting the unwelcome torrent of guilty emotions to leave as he did. But it didn't. It got worse, stronger. He shouldn't be walking away, shouldn't turn his back just because Dean was different. After all, Dean had stuck by him when nightmares had turned to visions and visions had turned to death. It was only fair that Sam do the same.

Slowly, he turned back toward the room. His brother had done so much for him, had raised him, had stuck by him, and defended him, had done so many things that Sam couldn't even remember clearly. He couldn't leave. He couldn't let those empty spots in his brother's heart stay empty. And if he didn't fill them, then what would?

His father had had empty spaces. He'd filled them with anger and hatred and vengeance and it had killed him. Dean tried to fill his own spaces with Sam, and Sam had left. He'd created more spaces, and that wasn't fair. Not when he himself was so whole.

He leaned back against the door, smiling to himself. Safety, warmth, love, comfort. A flood of something so strong that he'd fallen backwards to the blood colored floor. Just at the mention of his brother's name. Dean had known help was coming. Dean loved him.

It honestly didn't take Sam much effort to summon up his own warm feelings towards his brother. They'd been there all along, buried under a veil of concern and fear and sorrow. It was high time they got to see the light of day, though.

o0o0o0o0o

Dean could remember hating hospitals as a kid. They were always so cold and professional. No one let their emotions get in the way. No one really cared. They were too busy to care. Therefore, the hunter determined, the person who had just entered his room was not a doctor.

There was a slight scraping sound as one of the uncomfortable plastic chairs was drawn across the floor to rest beside the bed, and a creaking as someone sat down. The room had warmed up instantly, the same safety he'd felt in Lawrence creeping around him, causing once-stiff muscles to relax. Whoever was in the room, they loved him. He was starting to wonder where Sam was.

A careful hand grabbed his, slowly, gently, making sure not to disturb him. Too big to be Missouri's hand, so his first suspicions about his visitor were wrong. But who else could it be?

"I've made up my mind," a soft voice whispered, so low that Dean could barely hear, "I know what I want to do. Don't try to argue with me, because this is what I want." There was a pause, a moment in time for the visitor to let that statement sink in as Dean tried to decipher the quiet words and recognize the inaudible voice.

The silence filled the room, surrounding them, and Dean had a sneaking suspicion that whoever was talking to him was doing this for dramatic effect. When the voice spoke again, it was louder, recognizable, and firm. "I'm not leaving."

Dean's eyes snapped open and he looked up at his little brother. "What?" he asked hoarsely, scanning Sam's face for signs of a sick joke. He glanced around the room, searching for the source of that warmth, and, upon failing to find it, turned back to Sam.

"I'm serious," Sammy said, his voice soft again as he met Dean's eyes, "I want to stay. I'm not going back to school."

Dean blinked, staring his brother down as that feeling of safety and comfort and love grew stronger around him, enveloping him, making him whole again. "I thought-"

"Don't try to think," Sam smiled, "you'll hurt yourself."

Dean sighed and let his eyes slide shut. "Bitch," he muttered, grinning at the way the feeling surrounding him strengthened with the single word.

"Jerk."

"You're sure you want to do this, Psychic Boy?"

"I told you not to argue, and you can't call me that anymore, Emo."

"But life's no fun without nicknames, Haley Joel."

"That's what you think, Phoebe."

Dean opened his eyes. "What did you just call me?"

Sam's face reddened and embarrassment began to creep into the room. "It's that witch from 'Charmed.' She was like you."

"That's it," Dean said, shaking his head, "from now on, I'm keeping the remote. Honestly, the crap you watch…"

"You know," Sammy interrupted, "I meant what I said."

The elder rolled his eyes. "You want a hug really bad, don't you, Sammy?"

"I just want you to know-"

"And I get it. Please, just let me keep what little masculinity I have left. In case you missed it, I've recently been compared to one of Halliwells, and, hot as they were, it's not exactly a compliment. No more chick-flicks."

Sam nodded. "No more chick-flicks. Just promise me one thing."

"What's that?"

"Next time we go to the store, buy Pepsi."

Dean smirked. "Won't matter the brand, Sammy. You can't fight love."

"Bite me."

"Don't tempt me."

"That's called incest."

"_Winchester_ incest. Wincest."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "You've given this thought."

"Don't tell me you haven't thought about it."

"That's disgusting, Dean."

"You brought it up."

"Go to sleep."

"Subject-changer."

The younger hunter hung his head, grinning. "You look tired. That's all I'm saying."

The empath nodded, letting his eyelids droop. It had been a long week, a tiring week. He hated to admit it, but sleep was welcome, especially with that warmth surrounding him.

Sighing, Dean laid back and closed his eyes, letting out a long sigh as Sammy squeezed his hand. The room was warm, comfortable, and safe. He was loved, and he knew it. His brother had seen the light, had finally come around. His brother loved him. He knew that now, knew it for sure. It was, after all, coming straight from the heart.

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Thanks again for all the wonderful support,

Mummyluvr


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